Vaporware. Only a handful of anticipated titles this generation, titles who's developers are adamant that they are actually coming out, have the luxury of consistantly being labeled as such. In addition to Duke Nukem Forever, Microsoft and Remedy's survival horror game, Alan Wake (which was announced for 360/PC at E3 2006), has been delayed over and over again; which wouldn't be so bad if we actually knew anything about the damn game to begin with. The PR team for the title has kept us on blackout since day one, exceptionally well. With one official trailer, and some very hard to find pieces of tech demo footage, all we know is Alan Wake is pretty...and we want it. Microsoft recently spoke to Venture Beat at their Spring Showcase event, and said that in addition to them not showing the title there, it also [still] has no release date.

We haven’t announced a firm date for Alan Wake or Halo Wars. The stock answer is that they will ship when they are ready.

Will they ever be ready, though? Halo Wars, I don't think anyone is worried that that won't come out. Sure it's hidden away (yanked from being shown at Microsoft's event this week at last minute), but it's a Halo title. Come on, Remedy, one little trailer, please? Our fingers are crossed for E3.

Next Monday, Microsoft will be releasing two new games for the Xbox Originals lineup.  Stubbs The Zombie in Rebel Without a Pulse, and Gauntlet: Seven Sorrows are being made available for your throwback, retro goodness, and are both priced at 1200 Microsoft Points ($15).

Anyone planning to bite for either of these?  

In case you missed the news, this week's Xbox Live Arcade release is Assault Heroes 2, the follow up to the original XBLA hit.  Sierra asked if we'd like to enter a few of our readers into a random drawing to compete against the development team for AH2, and it took us a whopping seven seconds to reply back with an emphatic YES.  So to make this fair (and because Sierra told us we have to), we're going to have a contest to pick the three TAG readers that will be entered into that random drawing. You'll have to answer a few questions, but don't worry, we'll make them easy.  

Here's what you'll need to tell us:

• What is the name of the development studio that created both Assault Heroes and Assault Heroes 2? (Hint: it's not Sierra)
• Not counting the Assault Heroes games, name two other XBLA games that said developer has already released.
• What was the full release date for the original Assault Heroes on XBLA? (month, date, year)
• What are the names of the three basic weapons in the standard vehicle in Assault Heroes?

You'll want to email your answers to me directly, through our About Us page.  We're taking the first three entries that get all four answers correct., and those three people will have their names placed in a big hat at Sierra (or some other large, representative bin) for a chance to compete against the development team for Assault Heroes 2.  The battle against the dev team takes place on May 28th.  If you win, you'll have a chance to game against the people that made this little gem.  

Best of luck! 

Update: First spot is now claimed!  Only two spots left!

One of the things that most people I know were surprised to take away from Microsoft's Spring Showcase, aside from the few no show games,  was the lack of any word on a Spring Update for the console. We've been hearing that there may not be a Spring Update for quite some time, and that the process of adding new features might possibly revert to an annual occurance - something that seems out of place, when you think about it.

Nevertheless, we're well into Spring, and our friendly auto-update should be arriving soon, shouldn't it? Sadly, we have no word on anything headed our way...or do we? A tipster sent Kotaku the following list early this morning which they claim came from an internal source, and details everything (80 items in total) that will be added to the Xbox 360, and LIVE when the "Q2" update is rolled out.

Some of the more intriguing "additions" include the oft-rumored 4-way Voice Chat and Conference mode for Video Chat, the ability for users to see what video content (that which is downloaded through LIVE only) you are currently watching, the option to download a gamerpic from a profile you are viewing and support for Windows Live Mail integrated into Xbox LIVE. As well, there is mention of the HDD cache resetting code being removed (in favor of being able to delete individual patches),  voice/picture messages being able to be viewed and heard at Xbox.com (if you have a Gold account), "Calibration options for motion sensor devices" - which would confirm "Newton's" existence, and something we all suspected would happen eventually:

Support for titles to store installation data on Storage Device for faster loading.

If true, the days of the HDD-less SKU seem like they would be limited. Keep in mind that one of these so-called "lists" appears EVERY time there is an update on the way, and most of the features listed are but wishful thinking. Though, in the past, there have been quite a few additions that were nailed by rumors, and made it into the patch. Microsoft issued a curious response of:

We don’t comment on rumors or speculation, but what we can tell you is we’ve never seen this list before.

Once again, Microsoft is known for their expert denials of things just down the road (Elite, anyone?), but that's about as blunt of a "WTF?" as I've heard from them lately. In the grand scheme of things, though, this list of features prays on nearly every single item that the Xbox community has either dreamed of, or complained about. That, plus the fact the this is A LOTof stuff for one update, takes away from the legitimacy. More on this if it becomes available. Hit the jump for the full, 80-item list.

If you're anything like the millions of Gears of War players out there (including me), then you know that the game's online multiplayer was, and still is a central hub for blatent Achievement whoring boosting folks that love to ruin any sort of legit playability in Ranked games. I can't count the number of times I've heard "Alright...no one do anything, I'm trying to get my 'Seriously' achievement. I'll kick youz!" Um, how's about no?

During Gears of War 2's showing at Microsoft's showcase event, CliffyB told CVG that the development team are tackling this problem head on in the sequel. In addition to now being able to track your progress towards them, Epic will be "throttling" the amount of online Achievement s that players are able to earn in any one match.

If you're going for headshots, you get one headshot that counts and any other headshots won't count towards your Achievement, so players don't just play to get headshots the entire round just to get Achievements.

 
I don't want to get into too much of the multiplayer right now, but one thing I can confirm is that we are doing Achievement progress so that players will be able to essentially track how far they're getting with each Achievement in whichever mode.

Sounds like a plan, Cliff. Perhaps Ranked games in Gears 2 will actually be enjoyable. 

When Tecmo released Ninja Gaiden Sigma, a seriously updated and enhanced port of the original Xbox title, on the PS3 last year, PlayStation fans were no doubt happy that Xbox had lost an exclusive action franchise. Those hoping for either future ninja adventures with Ryu, or a port of Ninja Gaiden II to Sony's console in the future, Tomonobu Itagaki has cut you off at the knees. Speaking to Kotaku yesterday, the Ninja Gaiden/DOA creator said:

Personally I think we were able to create the definitive 3D game in this series so I'm not planing on making any other games in the series. So I hope fans treat this as a swan song for the franchise...I think we were able to achieve everything we wanted with this game so anything else would be extraneous. 

Kotaku asked him about the possibility of the game's sequel, which releases on Xbox 360 next month, ever releasing on PS3, to which he said:

That would be ridiculous.

So what's the mysterious, shades-wearing developer going to be doing with his time if he's not perfecting 60FPS killing animations? He says that he'd like to try and create something this is:

totally new, completely unrelated to anything I've done before. Not any part of any existing franchise. I think the Pacific theater of World War II is a interesting topic. I think it would be cool to work with an American developer and do a game based on the Pacific Theater...I think it would be cool to do something like what Clint Eastwood is doing for that time period.

Or, you know, if that doesn't work, he said he might just try his luck at a 'space' title... 

While the Spring Showcase has brought some incredible screenshots, interesting information, and a few great interview opportunities (expect our audio later this week), we're still missing a few things. The big no show of the Spring Showcase is Halo Wars, a title that was on the list of games to be demo'ed right up to the final itinerary, which was released to the attendees last week.  So where's the game?   Shane Kim had this to say:

We're not showing Halo Wars here today because we wanted to focus on these titles. When we show titles we want to show them when they are ready. We've learned that from a few games we showed too early, like Too Human. I'm excited with the progress we've made, Halo Wars is a lot of fun to play but it's not ready to show yet. 

It's an interesting statement.  While we give them credit for not showing the game too early, avoiding another Too Human At E3 2006 fiasco, something seems funky here.  As of last Thursday, Halo Wars was on the docket of games being demo'ed at the Spring Showcase.  What happened in the four days since then to change Microsoft's mind? 

Even more interesting is Shane Kim's comment that the game may slip to a 2009 release.  Yikes!   

Via CVG  

Sure, Rare, you're right. I wasn't nearly satisfied enough with those already amazing looking screenshots for Viva Pinata: Trouble in Paradise from yesterday. Could I possibly have some more, please? Oh...why thank you.

Fresh off the press sheet, here's two additional images from Microsoft and Rare's upcoming Pokemon-meets-gardening sequel, shipping this September - only on Xbox 360 (and then on PC nine months after).