I am usually not one for racing games, I admit. Especially not the more sim-ish ones. However, Need for Speed World, the upcoming addition to the now fast-growing franchise, has piqued my interest. How? The way everyone does it nowadays, with levels and experience points!

They’ve blended the traditional racing game with an MMO, touting a big, persistent world, gradual upgrades to your car and driver, and social connectivity.

They have just opened the beta registrations, you just have to go through the regular puter scans and surveys, so if you want your part in the beta, head over to the main site.

It’ll be interesting to see how this project pans out. A very usual problem in MMOs is lag, load times and other latency issues.  How will they deal with this in a racing game, a genre that requires pinpoint reflexes and precision. The races themselves will probably be instanced, but what about the overworld? You should be able to race people randomly there too, if you wanted to.

PS: I just realized that “NFSW” is a very confusing acronym.

In a recent interview with Jason Green of Black Rock Studios, we learn some new details about Disney Interactive’s upcoming title Split/Second.

One of the biggest concerns with Split/Second is that the game will get boring quickly. From what we already know about the title, the premise is to race other cars and blow things up. Which, right there, is a pretty solid concept as it is. However, it does raise the question “How many times can you blow the same things up before you get bored?” Check out Jason’s answers to these important questions after the jump.

Jason Green helps to shed some light on these questions. “We have more power plays that you can activate in one race, way more… If we sat down and had ten races with a check list sitting in front of us of all of the power plays, we could start getting through that list, but the combinations are through the roof.”

Green’s team, in their effort to answer these questions, had a mathematician do some number crunching for them, and concluded that the number of unique races (as far as the “power plays” are concerned) is “in the millions”, and this doesn’t even account for the number of races you’ll spend just trying to learn the courses.

Learning the tracks is also going to be a challenge, even for veteran racing gamers, as the power plays will actually alter the course of the track. With the proposed “millions” of possibilities, this means that there would be a similarly large number of possible course combinations, as well, as each lap will follow a different path.

According to Green, “You can’t have one race and learn a lap. You learn the tracks through the different attacks being possible.” He also makes an interesting comparison to the replay value of explosions, in which he says, “… that’s kind of like saying once you learn a tight corner on a track does it get boring? No, it doesn’t, you just refine how you go around that corner.”

In this interview, Green did not disclose how many tracks were available in the game. There is also no word yet on whether or not we’ll see any DLC courses in the future.

Harmonix CEO Alex Rigopulos has said that Rock Band 3 will be a “big step forward” for the series when it launches later this year.

In an interview with Gamerant, he also said that E3 will be a grand reveal for the innovations that Rock Band 3 is bringing to the table.

“Unfortunately I can’t say anything about Rock Band 3 at this point except that it’s coming this fall and it’s a big step forward for Rock Band,” said Rigopulos.

“This has been a two-year development cycle on this title and it’s a pretty significant level up from where we’ve been. We’re pretty excited about unveiling it at E3 this year. Holiday 2010 release.”

Rigopulos also states that there are “big plans” for the future of the series (bigger than Rock Band Network?!) and makes comment of the much debated battle between Rock Band and Guitar Hero.

“Honestly, we don’t spend a lot of time thinking about the rivalry between the two franchises,” he said about the much publicized “rivalry.”

“We’re really just focused on, not just Rock Band, but the [music game] category as a whole and what we need to do to get there. And for us, that’s just a secondary consideration.”

In my opinion, any rivalry that was left flew out the window when Rock Band Network went live.

Make sure to pick up Rock Band 3 this holiday season for the best music gaming experience of your life (now with more Vitamin Instrument Teaching)!

In an interview with NowGamer, Grasshopper boss Goichi Suda said that although No More Heroes 2 wraps up the story of Travis Touchdown, No More Heroes 3 has a possibility of existing.

The catch? Fan demand has to be high enough to realize this idea.

“I want to conclude Travis Touchdown’s story with this game,” said Suda.

“But No More Heroes 2 is really for fans of the first one, so if I get a lot of response from the fans asking for a No More Heroes 3 – and as long as Rising Star make a lot of sales – then it’s possible that we could do a third game.”

When asked if he would ever do with No More Heroes what Kojima is doing with Metal Gear Solid and continue a series for a long while, he said:

“I think the reason that Kojima keeps on making Metal Gear Solid games is because he gets so many requests from his fans, and people who want to see more Snake. If people sincerely want to see more Travis Touchdown, I think it’s my responsibility to meet their requests.”

No More Heroes 2: Desperate Escape is already available stateside and has an expected release of April for European territories.

SCE localisation liaison Yeonkyung Kim revealed at this year’s GDC that the company made a huge mistake passing up on publishing Demon’s Souls.

Japanese and Asian releases of the game were handled by Sony, but US localized publishing was handed off to Atlus. No European release has been spoken of by either firm.

“That was a mistake,” he said. “It should have come out as a first-party title.”

Kim admitted that it would be something of a “niche title,” which is why it wasn’t originally picked up. Expected sales of Demon’s Souls were in the area of 15,000, but the game has sold almost a quarter of a million copies.

Hopefully, there’s a sequel to this awesome game on the way, but if you haven’t managed to play it (and have access to it), go get it!

The first expansion for Dragon Age: Origins, Awakening, is now available through the Xbox Live Marketplace.

The download clocks in at a hefty 2 GB download and will cost you a pretty penny – 3200 Microsoft Points, to be exact. If you’re not familiar with the conversion, that’s $40.

You can grab the expansion here.

PC and 360 retail versions will be available this Friday, and the PS3 version will be digital download only in Europe, but will be getting a retail version as well in the US.

Finally! Crackdown 2 has just received an official release date in the UK. The title will be hitting shelves in the country on July 9.

Ruffian’s also released the first ViDoc for the game.

A summer release was originally mentioned a few months ago by Ruffian Games, but this is the first confirmation of an exact release date.

Full press release after the cut.

Justice Returns to Pacific City with the Launch of “Crackdown 2” in July

Video documentary series provides an inside look at this summer’s most explosive blockbuster

LONDON – Monday 15 March – Pacific City needs your help, agents. A new enemy has overrun the city and it’s time to restore law and order by any means necessary when “Crackdown 2” releases this July around the world. Microsoft and Ruffian Games today announced that the exhilarating, open-world action game will hit the streets on 9 July.

Developed by Ruffian Games exclusively for Xbox 360, “Crackdown 2” is the sequel to the award-winning 2007 title, “Crackdown.” Offering cutting edge gameplay, “Crackdown 2” will take multiplayer gaming to unprecedented heights, providing you and your friends with complete freedom to explore, destroy, and play your way as you restore justice to Pacific City.

To celebrate the road to launch, Ruffian Games invites fans to step into the world of “Crackdown 2” in the first video documentary, titled “Fun with Friends,” from a three-part series exploring different facets of the game.

“Fun with Friends” features interviews with Ruffian Games Creative Director Billy Thomson, Lead Producer James Cope, Senior Engineer David Hynd and Senior Mission Designer Dean Smith as they discuss what it takes to design a living, breathing sandbox world with the most gripping multiplayer experiences yet, including 16-player PVP and 4-player co-op. The video documentary also shines a light on some of the extraordinary antics and mayhem that players can look forward to, including Renegade Orbs and the PVP mode called Rocket Tag, when they bring their personal brand of justice to Pacific City.

Well, this is interesting. RPAD.TV spent the entirety of GDC digging up rumors of the “DS2″, and they got some juicy tidbits.

The rumor is that this new handheld would basically have Gamecube technology, scaled down. This would be because it is apparently much easier to develop for.

It would still have dual screens, but the gap between them would be almost not noticeable, making developers able to make games with either two screens, or one long one.

Also of note is this:

The next Nintendo handheld has an accelerometer. I blame the iPhone for this. Everything has to have an accelerometer now. Yesterday I bought a sandwich at the Moscone Center and it had an accelerometer in it.

Thank you Nintendo. As we didn’t look stupid enough on the bus already, shouting “OBJECTION!” or blowing in to our handhelds.

A couple of things strike me with this rumor. RPAD say the developers should have their games finished by the end of this year. Isn’t that a little too soon after the DS XL? Of course, this would be a completely new system instead of just an aesthetic update, but it still strikes me as quite fast. Oh well, I suppose both the PS2 slim and the GBA SP came out  late in the cycle.

If this is accurate, what will they call it? Nintendo is not one for slapping a “2″ on their hardware, but this is still a dual screen handheld device, so I’d say they would need to keep “DS” somewhere in the name. DS Advanced? Super DS?

Expect more updates on this through the year. Especially around E3, if Nintendo have something like this to reveal, you can bet a lot of money they are going to unveil it there.

According to Official PlayStation Magazine, a “Massive Sequel” will be announced in next month’s issue. Luckily, OPM has revealed a significant clue. The “Massive Sequel” is a racing game that may challenge GT5’s racing crown.

Straight from OPM, “We’ve seen a top-secret driving game that may threaten GT5’s racing crown. More next month – be excited.”

What it could it be? Could it be Motorstorm 3, Need For Speed, or Burnout?

Stay tuned for more information.

Anyone who has been a fan of gaming for a while now is more than familiar with Insomniac Games, long time supporters of the PlayStation formats and creators of famous franchises such as Spyro the Dragon and Ratchet and Clank. If certain rumours are to be believed though, this exclusive support may soon come to an end.

A “trusted source” who spoke to IGN anonymously during GDC claims that the company intends to go multi-platform.

Existing franchise are, as far as we know, locked into exclusivity on the PS3 for now, but this does not stop the company from creating a new franchise for the other existing consoles, the Xbox 360 and the Wii.

Insomniac is refusing to comment on this rumour for the time being, but we’ll let you know if something comes of it. I personally would be extremely surprised if this turned out to be true.

Well, this is interesting. According to Andriasang, Square Enix’s recruit page has a listing looking for staff for work on a “next generation” gaming engine.

“At Square Enix, in anticipation of the appearance of next generation platforms, we’ve started development on a new generation game engine for competing beyond the level of the strong developers throughout the world, and are presently seeking a lot of talent.”

Square used the image of Cloud from Final Fantasy VII in the listing, but we probably shouldn’t read into that too much – it’s most likely just a picture for the sake of promoting the company’s image. The FFVII remake rumours stopped running their course a long time ago.

In these sandbox times established by the likes of GTA, Carmageddon and Sim City, it seems to me like linearity has become a sin when it comes to game development. Unless you’re making a certain type of game, a linear style of gameplay and story progression seems to have certain fans screaming for blood.

Final Fantasy XIII in particular has had to endure a lot of flack for keeping the first 25 hours of the game strictly linear, while other games that used to be linear like the Prince of Persia series are going for something more akin to a sandbox title.

I’ve always upheld that linearity is far from a bad thing. I grew up playing linear games and some of my favourite games of all time are completely linear. So I ask you

- Why is linearity considered such a pet peeve of certain gamers?

- Is a sandbox title inherently better than a level based, linear game?

Valve boss Gabe Newell told 1UP that Portal 2 would allow the studio to take the concept and apply it on a much larger scale.

“One of the nice things about The Orange Box was it allowed us to try out a couple of different things, and Portal really seemed to resonate,” Newell said during his GDC spot.

“We got the signals that we wanted – this is what people liked; this is what people didn’t like. And to us, it was like, ‘OK, now we know how to take this big,’ so that’s what we’re going to do with Portal 2.

“It’s the best game we’ve ever done,” he added.

While the original Portal was fairly short (clocking in at about three to four hours), Portal 2 will be an standalone full-fledged game.

Portal 2 is due out this holiday season for PC, Mac and Xbox 360.

Valve boss and co-founder Gabe Newell spoke openly about the subject of DRM on PC games during the GDC conference yesterday.

“One thing that you hear us talk a lot about is entertainment as a service,” Newell said. “It’s an attitude that says ‘What have I done for my customers today?’

“It informs all the decisions we make, and once you get into that mindset it helps you avoid things like some of the Digital Rights Management problems that actually make your entertainment products worth less by wrapping those negatives around them.”

Develop says that Newell’s comments about the subject were met with cheers.

Ubisoft is the latest company to institute a type of DRM that restricts a player’s usage of their games (in this case, a constant internet connection is required, or else the game is unplayable), and this decision has caused a lot of negative feedback from the PC gaming community on the subject.

Max Schaefer, CEO of Runic games, the developers behind PC Action RPG Torchlight, said that the game may be headed to consoles and that a “serious effort” is being put into the idea.

“We’re going to put some serious effort into it — pretty quick — getting ‘Torchlight’ onto consoles,” Schaefer said.

“There’s a lot of really cool things about the console world, too, that would work well with our game.”

For fans of Diablo and Diablo-type games, Torchlight is an excellent addition to the genre, especially since Diablo III won’t be seen on PC for at least another hundred years or so.