Contest Closed! Thanks for playing.

As you all clearly know, I love me some Halo. And if my full suit of Master Chief armor doesn’t hammer home that message, I really don’t know what will. The games, the novels, the movies (Legends wasn’t bad!), the comics… I just can’t get enough. And that includes the hilarious Red. vs Blue series.

Red vs. Blue: Season 9 continues the story of Red vs Blue: Revelation, and breaks the same rules that RvB:R did… we’re introduced to a story being told without the traditional Halo engine, and instead, are treated to pre-rendered CGI.

And while the story this series tells gets a little confusing at times (there are two distinct story arcs through the twenty episode series, one of which goes back and uses the Halo engine), the Rooster Teeth crew continue to deliver a hilarious narrative that Halo fans everywhere will love.

The DVD has all the usual suspects that Red vs. Blue releases tend to include. Hilarious director’s commentary, outtakes and deleted scenes, cast interviews, and the PSAs that Rooster Teeth is celebrated for. Since you can watch the series for free online, it’s a must to include this sort of stuff for fans. And they give you a lot of it, especially with the behind the scenes videos.

The folks at New Video Group were kind enough to send over a bunch of copies to giveaway. I’ve got three copies of Season 9 up for grabs here. Just leave a comment about your favorite game in the Halo series for a chance to win. I’ll pick one of you at random next week and drop a copy in the mail.

Be sure to scope out Rooster Teeth’s website for more information on Red vs. Blue. Old episodes, hilarious comics… they do some great work, those guys.

Today’s Geek of the Week is Greg Lobanov, a student at Drexel University.

He’s roughly a decade younger than the average Geekadelphia writer and already cranking out multiple video games, effectively making us oldheads look bad.

Are you currently in school? Where do you go and what for?

I attend Drexel University, studying Digital Media. I’m currently in my second year, and it’s been quite a learning experience thus far. It’s been my first time working with 3D modeling and animation, I must say it’s been quite a challenge.

How did you get into game design?

I can’t pin it to a single moment or reason—from a very young age I enjoyed making games, though back then it was with paper, cardboard and markers. Something about it felt very natural to me, defining rules of play and making the pieces. I also loved drawing comics and writing stories to go with them. When I started to get into computers and the internet, all those things got tangled up, until some point I was making computer games.

What kind of games or people inspire you?

I think the best (and most inspiring) games are the ones that give the best “feel.” You might be thinking that’s very vague, but I stand by it. I find a lot of games very interesting and effective for all very unique reasons. The qualities that make a good game are far from universal; they’re hard to define in strict germs. Generally, I think that you can realize a game is great from the point of being able to nearly feel the passion that the artists and designers put into it. That passion transfers into my own work.

I liken myself to director Quentin Tarantino and musician James Murphy in the respect that my inspirations are often shown very clearly through my work and combining them in unique ways. (more…)

Contest Closed! Thanks for playing.

Assassin’s Creed. I absolutely adore this video game series, and when Ubisoft released the outstanding Lineage mini-series, I was psyched. Live action Assassin’s Creed? Hells yeah. You can watch the full thing for free on YouTube, or if you’d like to scope it out on the big screen in HD… you could pick it up on DVD or Blu-ray.

Assassin’s Creed: Lineage serves as the prequel to Assassin’s Creed II, Brotherhood and Revelations. In the story we’re introduced Giovanni Auditore… Ezio’s father. Hunted in the midst of a conspiracy (a popular trope in the Assassin’s Creed series), he’s forced to fight for his life as he tries to expose a dark secret held by some of the most powerful families in Italy.

This is a pretty easy Blu-ray to talk about, considering the entire short film runs a little over half an hour. What you’re really paying for here is the amazing digital transfer (it looks gorgeous) and a number of short featurettes, including some making-of clips and developer diaries. All in all, with the series and the features, you’re looking at about an hour of content here.

On DVD, Assassin’s Creed: Lineage goes for a cheap $10, on Blu-ray, about $12 . The cheap price point, the solid story, and decent mini features, make this a great purchase for that mad Assassin’s Creed fan in your life, or even for yourself. It’s definitely worth the buy if you’re a diehard fan.

Now, for those crazy fans still reading, I’ve got THREE copies of Assassin’s Creed: Lineage on Blu-ray to giveaway. Just leave a comment about your favorite Assassin’s Creed character for a chance to win. I’ll email winners sometime next week.

Requiescat in pace…

Local game developer Cipher Prime, award winning creators of the games Auditorium and Pulse, have recently released an updated version of their addictive music/puzzle game called Fractal. Featuring colorful graphics, cool music, various play modes, and deceptively simple gameplay, Fractal will keep you hooked for hours.

Fractal’s main campaign starts you of creating “blooms”, which is when you connect a group of similarly colored pieces called fractals to create a giant hexagon cluster on the board. For every bloom you create, you also are rewarded with music. The more blooms you take off the board, the more music you hear within the level.

The catch is that you only have  a certain amount of fractals to put on the board while also trying to achieve a certain amount of points per level. As you move through the campaign, the difficulty certainly ramps up. Multiple colored fractals pop up on the board, suddenly making the player have to be aware that the upcoming fractal might destroy an attempted bloom combo.

While playing Fractal I was reminded of the game Lumines, but while that game had a style of gameplay very reminiscent of the classic puzzler Tetris, Fractal feels like it’s own thing. It has its own style  and pace. The campaign doesn’t have you trying to complete a level within a certain timeframe, nor does it suddenly ramp up the speed of gameplay. It all comes down to the player. How the player decides to interact with the level determines the tension and complexity of each level. Needless to say you can discover multiple ways of creating blooms within a level which certainly ups the replay value of the game. (more…)

As most of you know, we’re huge fans of Chipocrite here on Geekadelphia. You might have caught him performing at Lebowskifest at the TLA earlier this year, and back in the Summer, he wrote the theme song for the Philly Geek Awards, which you can absolutely still download from us.

Well, he was recently nominated for the Deli Philadelphia’s Featured Artist poll, and we sure would love to see him on there. Just head over to the site and look for the voting column on the right hand side there. Select Chipocrite and vote. Note, if you select anyone else, YOU ARE DOING IT WRONG.

Voting ends December 1st, so share the link. Let’s get him up there.

Halo: Combat Evolved was to the original Xbox what Goldeneye 007 was to the Nintendo 64. In other words, Master Chief’s struggle with the Covenant not only sold a lot of consoles, but set a new standard for multiplayer shooters.

A long 10 years later, we celebrate developer Bungie’s contribution to video games by–how else?–playing more Halo. The Spartans’ baton has been passed to Microsoft’s own 343 Industries, and its first order of business was to commemorate a decade of Halo with Halo: Combat Evolved Anniversary.

Frankly, any self-respecting Halo fan owes it to himself (or herself) to fork up the $40 for Halo Anniversary. And that’s for far more reason than the simple fact that it’s a Halo game. This is the most feature-rich, loving revival of a classic game you’ve likely experienced in a long while.

The point of an HD revival is to remind you of the wonderful experience you enjoyed years ago with a fresh coat of paint, but 343 has made that reminder even more powerful. (more…)

Philly-based composer and vocalist Matt Campana is currently in a contest to have his work featured in the next Assassin’s Creed.

Matt’s work with music stretches back nearly a decade, starting with private music lessons. In recent years he’s acquired some additional skills and knowledge through Drexel University’s Music Technology and Berklee College of Music’s Composition and Game Audio programs.

He’s created quality music and audio assets for film, TV and video games. Some of his past work includes arrangement for Video Games Live. In an effort to run with that idea, he’s now looking to get his work included in the upcoming Assassin’s Creed: Revelations.

Let’s help a fellow Philadelphian and geek out by casting our vote on UJAM. It’s simple, just head here and click the Facebook “like” button. At the time of writing this, he’s number 9. After the voting ends, the top 20 will be reviewed by Hans Zimmer (top Hollywood and video game composer) himself.

Vote now. It ends tonight at 11:59pm

For more info about Matt and his work, visit his website:
www.MattCampana.net

Let’s get this out of the way right now. Warhammer 40k: Space Marine is the biggest gaming surprise of the Summer. In fact, it might be the biggest game-related surprise I’ve ever had. When THQ emailed me about the title, I shrugged it off as shovelware… but wow, it’s as though Gears of War and Darksiders fell in love and had a beautiful baby clothed in an ostentatious suit of armor… wait, wait. Space armor.

Switching on this game, there is no opening cinematic, just a brief blip about something going wrong on some random planet. Right away, you’re thrust into a world full of questions. Why are there Orcs in space? Why do other soldiers treat your character like he’s a deity of some kind? Why do the Orcs (who are in space) have cockney accents? What’s with the floating skulls scanning dead people and emblazoned on every single door? What are these Titan war machines, and why do citizens refer to them as The Machine Gods?

All these questions and more are raised, but never answered. And you know what? It doesn’t matter. Because you’re too busy having fun to give a damn. All hail the Emperor, whoever the hell he is. (more…)

Mobad Media and Arcana Studios have partnered to produce The Gwaii, a 3-D comic (no glasses needed) book for the iPad. Geekadelphia was given the chance to check out the 1st issue and we have the skinny on this innovative piece of media.

While The Gwaii is decidedly family and child oriented, the story is original enough to make for an interesting read to a comic fan like myself. Written by Arcana co-founder Sean Reilly and illustrated by Pedro Del Gado, The Gwaii centers around Tanu, a sasquatch in the Canadian wilderness that loses his mother to hunters turned kidnappers of this rare animal. Tanu teams up with fellow sasquatch Jaada and the adventure begins.

This iPad app is extremely easy to use and perfect for sharing with the young geek in your life. There are great options for kids like having the story narrated to them (it also highlights the words as they’re being read in this mode to assist in learning) and toggling back and forth between dialogues as they appear on the page. While it hearkens a bit to the motion comic movement, the “no glasses required” 3-D was pretty effective and looked vibrant on the iPad.

Gwaii part one is available right now at the iTunes store with 2 more issues on the way. You can download your copy right here.

Or better yet, why don’t you leave us a comment below for a chance to win a free download of The Gwaii? Just tell us which nomenclature you prefer: sasquatch, bigfoot or yeti?

Cipher Prime, the makers of the hit iPad game Pulse, have reason to celebrate. Their title has been sitting in the App Store’s top 10 list for iPad music games for 12 straight weeks. That’s a serious accomplishment for the mini indie game dev studio, located here in Old City, Philadelphia.

So, in honor of this accomplishment, they’re running a one-week only sale on their game.

Now through Wednesday, Cipher Prime has reduced the price of Pulse to $1.99 (60% savings over the regular $4.99 price). If you already own the game, great… now go tell your friends.

Transformers: War for Cybertron was, hands down, the biggest surprise in gaming for me last year. Despite all the hype surrounding the title, I had serious doubts. Blogs, print magazines, Twitter… everyone was fussing over this title, and I didn’t want to hear any of it. I mean, come on, have you played any of the other Transformers titles? Transformers: The Game or Revenge of the Fallen? Of course you haven’t, why would you do that to yourself?

However, with Gears of War-esque, third-person-shooter style gameplay, an intriguing canon-approved storyline, fluid controls and surprisingly good voice acting, High Moon Studios did the impossible… they redeemed the Transformers franchise in the world of gaming. And now, one year later, they’ve released Transformers: Dark of the Moon, a tie-in to the likely terrible (I’ve yet to see it, and probably won’t) film.

There’s a rule when it comes to most movie-game tie-ins… and that’s that the game is always disappointing. Not entirely so with this one. High Moon’s Transformers: Dark of the Moon isn’t a terrible game. In fact, I’d say its a rather great one. Unfortunately, the game is so short and lacking in features, that its hard to justify the high price tag. (more…)

As everyone knows, we are in the middle of one of the worst recessions in history right now. Jobs are disappearing at an alarming rate and most businesses are trying to figure out how to cope. One of the few fields that has seen only a minor bump has been the video game industry. For the most part sales have remained strong and developers are still hiring game designers and artists to work on their next big project.

That is why it is so important (and cool) that Pennsylvania Senator Daylin Leach has introduced a video game tax credit bill in the Senate. If passed, it would create a 25% tax credit for video game companies that are based right here in PA and it would be an important first step toward bringing new jobs and video game developers to the city of Philadelphia. Plus it would be a great help to allow game existing studios already in Philly to expand and grow.

So how can you help this become a reality? First, spread the word. For this to work it has to go beyond just the geek culture and enter the mainstream. Second, contact the representative for your area and let them know you want this bill passed. You can find out how to accomplish this here.

This will go a long way toward making this a reality and making Philly the next “it” place to develop and create video games. Wouldn’t it be awesome to say that the next Halo or Gears of War was made right here in Philadelphia?

VGI Philadelphia
www.vgiphilly.com