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

Already hotly rumoured, a conference call today according to IGN confirms Activision to develop the game for the Transformers movie.
Activision’s got some solid developers making Spider-Man and an endless stream of Tony Hawk titles.  Few publishers are better suited for this type of license…

Vaporware: Better Late Than Never comes from Wired, and recognizes the most delayed and missed technology products from 2005.  Infinium Phantom and Twilight Princess make the list, as do the MIA Starcraft Ghost and  the sequel to Team Fortress.
But could anything possible be #1 but…

Duke Nukem Forever, which has been in development since 1997.  DN 3D was the first game  I ever played on a LAN, and that was a long, long time ago…

Rockstar is pretty much to the video game industry what the South is to hip hop. They may not be as ‘abstract’ as everyone else, but they add their own unique twists to tried and true gaming conventions that, other  developers will be all too happy to try to emulate.  (See Driv3er, True Crime, and Narc) So with that in mind, lets look at 2 of their most recent games.

The warriors is based upon the cult classic 1979 film.  This is probably one of the most referenced films in hip hop next to Scarface.  Anyone who has seen the film can tell that that could make a game in and of itself, but Rockstar manages to add in new content to flesh out the backstory.  You’ll learn how the warriors spent the summer leading up to the big meeting, get up close and personal with the gangs seen only briefly in the film, and even learned how the gang got together.  The game starts at the fateful night where gang leader and visionary Cyrus is gunned down, but in a Quentin Taratino-esque twist, we flashback to 3 months before the meeting, which makes up 2/3rds of the game.  Rockstar attempts to reinvent the brawler for a new generation (an act barely achieved successfully by fighting force and Gekkido on the PS1) by combining elements of their other titles such as GTA and Manhunt, and they succeed.   The environments are large and open with hidden objectives to discover, and some stealth elements and minigames help move this game away from the same ol same ol brawler territory.  Also to note is the team dynamic, in which you can use the right analog stick to issue commands to your AI controlled teammates.  Although it takes some time to get used to, this isn’t complicated at all, and you can do anything from having them wreck the place to watching your back.  The game also does a fine job of capturing the look and feel of the movie throughout the game, as much of the last third of the game is directly out of the movie.  Several unlockables (including a double dragon-esque arcade game) help round this out and keep players coming back for more.

As the latest entry in Rockstar’s franchise, Grand Theft Auto:  Liberty city stories doesn’t do anything that hasn’t been done in the past three entries, almost being a step backwards, as many of the features and enhancements from Vice City and San Andreas have been left out.  Your protagonist can’t swim, targeting is as cumbersome as ever, and many of the missions range from just plain bland to outright frustrating.  However, as a PSP game, GTA LCS is one of the first real ‘must buy’ games for the system.  It contains everything that GTA is known for (a free open world, a dirty sense of humor, a somewhat compelling plot, and a vast selection of weapons and vehicles to utilize in order to wreak havoc on civilians), and it brings every square foot of liberty city to PSP.  Also, this is the first version to feature wireless multiplayer.  Although it’s ad-hoc only, it’s still nice to finally have this in a game without having to rely on a PC hack.  Also interesting to note is that a save game exploit can be used to load homebrew games for users stuck with an upgraded PSP.

I’ve been late with the past few Southern Fried Sundays, but next time I’ll have a note from my mom. Anyway, this album was a very important one for the south, especially No Limit records. It contained the single of the decade, “Bout it Bout it”. This was at a time when Master P was leaving the bay area, so the new (at the time) producers Beats by the pound, along with rappers Mr Serv On and Mia X really stand out. Veterans King George, Big ED and C-Murder also show up. C-Murder especially has dope verses on the album’s first track ‘187 dance’ and the song ‘living like a killa’. Master P and C-Bo collaborate on “How We Break Bread”. This LP is hard to find nowadays, but if you do, pick it up, and take a trip back to ten years ago when the tank was on top of the world and they made quality music.

This picture of Chris Penn in all his hairy-chested glory is more flattering than the one on his IMDB page that has already been used on one of the first sites to report his death. I first saw it reported on MTV News in a brief rundown of minor stories earlier tonight, and it wasn’t until an hour or so later than Google News turned up something. No word yet on cause of death, but dude was only 43.

Top 10 Reasons Chris Penn was awesome:

1. He handled being the 3rd most famous Penn brother with grace and humility. Or maybe he was a bitter, egotistical ass, I don’t really know.

2. He was in Rush Hour, but I tend to think of him more for his appearance as a bartender in the video from the movie’s soundtrack for Jay-Z’s “Can I Get A…”.

3. His other notable music video role was in Sublime’s “Date Rape” video, as the titular date rapist.

4. Cribbed from his IMDB page: “Is in three different movies with close-range shootout scenes at the end (Reservoir Dogs (1992), True Romance (1993), and Corky Romano (2001)).”

5. He filmed a scene in True Romance right after Michael Madsen’s rottweiler ripped his throat out.

6. Also cribbed from IMDB: “Originally had role in American Pie 2 (2001) as Stiffler’s dad but the scenes were cut since they were not deemed to fit in with the original movie.” Stifler’s dad! Can you imagine that? Mabye if they hadn’t cut him, he’d have gotten a spot in the straight-to-DVD American Pie Presents Band Camp with that kid who played Stifler’s brother.

OK, six reasons is enough. One love, CP.

The Dresden Dolls are Amanda Palmer (keyboards and Vocals) and Brian Viglione (Drums). Straight off the there amazing first album and an opening spot on the first NIN tour in four years, The Dresden Dolls Released there first DVD in November. From the blistering opening song Good Day to the Black Sabbath cover of War Pigs to the single Girl Anachronism the Dolls put on an explosive and manic performance the very few “traditional” bands can accomplish. Amanda seems like the crazy girl we all know. While Brian has a charisma that very few front men let alone drummers have. The DVD contains the performance from their home town of Boston and the incredible videos for Coin Operated Boy and Girl Anachronism.

At ten dollars or less this DVD is an amazing deal.