If it’s Friday, it’s time for This Week In Downloads….or TWID Notes…or stuff to get over the internets on your console (and PC). The gaming gods shine brightly on all console owners….except the Wii but we’ll get to that in a moment.
PlayStation Store
This week we are going to go in reverse order…think of it as a bizarro TWID Notes. Or not. Anyway, let’s discuss the PlayStation store. I have to give Sony some positive vibes here, as the content has been much improved over the past two weeks. First off we have two new demos: NBA Live 08 and John Woo Presents Stranglehold. NBA Live 08 has some potential, especially after the disaster that was Live 07 on the 360, which truly should have been recalled a la Front Page Sports Football Pro 99. Be forewarned however, I did notice a little stuttering here and there on the Live demo which I did not notice on the 360. Hopefully that will be cleaned up in the final release.
Stranglehold is an M rated game for a reason: just shoot one of the guys in the crotch and you’ll see why. This demo looks a lot like the 360 demo released last week.
In addition to some new game trailers/videos there was one other item that was definitely worth noting on the PlayStation 3 – new MotorStorm content. Again, kudos should be given for Sony continuing to support the game so long after release—on the other hand, some of this stuff should have been in the original retail game, but we digress. There’s a free update to bring the game to version 2.0 and new add-on content that includes a new track, a new multiplayer mode, new vehicles and new races. It will set you back $5.99. There’s also a Ninja Gaiden Sigma add-on which includes 5 new survival modes and will cost you $2.99.
Not a bad week at all for the PS Store, eh? It’s almost like the Store made you it’s bitch, no?
GameTap
How’s that for a segue way? Let’s turn the wayback machine all the way back to 2000. Remember those heady days? Back then people were subscribing to print magazines, and yours truly was a contributing editor to one of those magazines. In that same magazine, you’d see an ad showing how John Romero would "make you his bitch." We were told to suck it down! What sort of awesomeness could he have been talking about? None other than John Romero’s Daikatana, of course. I know many of our readers may not have been playing games in 2000, so let’s just say that this game was like Lair, except the graphics were awful and you had to kill horrible evil frogs. Ok, I lied, it was nothing like Lair but it did have similar reviews.
This week launches the GameTap indies program with two games: Blast Miner and Morning’s Wrath. I don’t want to take away from fellow GameSharker James’ “The Indies” column but GameTap is a great venue to try these new games. Infernal and Startopia round out this week’s GameTap offering. You need to try Daikatana just for the history lesson.