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North American PSN Store Update: 3/01/2012

Dazbobaby — Wed, 04 Jan 2012 10:25:09 +0000

Hi Everyone -
Happy New Year and welcome to the first PlayStation Store update for 2012! It’s going to be an exciting year with lots to look forward to on PlayStation Network, so with that said, let’s get to the good stuff.

With football action in full swing, now may be the perfect time to up the action with NFL Blitz; especially if your favorite team might not be looking so good to make it to the playoffs! Rewrite your season with the arcade-style gameplay that made the original a hit, packed with the immersive game modes of today. NFL Blitz is recharged and available now on PlayStation Network.

New PSN Game release TNT Racers also races to the PlayStation Store today. Featuring lightning fast racing action, diverse multiplayer modes, cool tracks and snappy gadgets, TNT Racers may be just the kick you need to jump start your year.

As mentioned in the PlayStation Plus January Sneak Peek post, Plus subscribers are able to download the entire Back to the Future The Game – Full Series, free for the entire month! Additional free content this month includes PSN Game Sword and Soldiers, and PS one Classics Syphon Filter, Syphon Filter 2 and Syphon Filter 3; all available for subscribers with today’s update.

That said, have a full look at the list below and leave your comments below. You can also join in the discussion on the PlayStation Community forums in the PlayStation Store Update thread.

Here is the weekly PlayStation Store update:

PlayStation Plus

Don’t have PlayStation Plus? Click here to purchase your subscription today!

Free PSN Games:	Back to the Future The Game – Full Series Sword & Soldiers
Free PS one Classics:	Syphon Filter Syphon Filter 2 Syphon Filter 3
Discounted PSN Games:	Rocket Knight – 50% off – 1/3 (PS+ Price $7.50)
Discounted PS3 Full Games:	Darksiders – 20% off – 1/3 (PS+ Price $15.99)
Full Game Trials:	Darksiders

PSN Games

TNT Racers + Trial ($9.99)
TNT Racers is a fun multiplayer racing game full of variety, combining fast as lightning race action with brand new features. The Shadow Race feature lets every player stay in the race even if a driver is clearly in an inferior position.
ESRB rated E
File size 150 MB

NFL Blitz ($14.99)
The all-new NFL Blitz combines the arcade-style gameplay from the original with the deep, immersive game modes of today! Whether you’re battling your rival in a 7-on-7 grudge match or fighting your way through a season of the Blitz Gauntlet, Every Game Is a Two-Minute Drill!
ESRB rated E10+
File size 1.9 GB

PS3 Full Games

Darksiders ($19.99)
Darksiders is a third-person, single player action/adventure game inspired by the characters, themes and mythology of the apocalypse and the battle of Armageddon described by the Book of Revelation.
ESRB rated M
File size 10 GB

Game Demos (free)

TNT Racers
TNT Racers is a fun multiplayer racing game full of variety, combining fast as lightning race action with brand new features. The Shadow Race feature lets every player stay in the race even if a driver is clearly in an inferior position. But the best things are the wicked pick-ups which will ultimately decide about victory or defeat. TNT – Tracks N Tricks – cool tracks and snappy gadgets!
ESRB rated E
File size 150 MB

Learning With The Pooyoos – Episode 2 Demo
With the PooYoos, a merry band of adorable baby animals, children will have fun while learning the basics for his or her development: numbers, letters, space, colors and more.
ESRB rated E
File size 272 MB

Add-on Game Content

Resistance 3 The Legacy Grenade (free)
The No. 60 Air Fuel Grenade has been issued for combating Chimera in tight spaces commonly found in urban conflicts. The grenade will adhere to almost any surface, biological or otherwise, and deployed a cloud of flammable vapor. Once released, the cloud ignited, creating a massive explosion.” This fan favorite grenade makes a special return to the single-player campaign of Resistance 3
File size 103 KB

Resistance 3 SPRA Black Ops Skin (free)
The backbone of the US effort against the Chimera during the war, Black Ops troops were a common site at SRPA facilities and during special operations. Mostly killed and destroyed, this special multiplayer skin lets you return as one of the most mysterious soldiers from R:FOM and R2.
File size 103 KB

Resistance 3 Infected Nathan Hale Skin and Taunt (free)
Lt. Nathan Hale skipped his viral inhibitor treatments in the final hours of Resistance 2, in order to continue the fight against the Chimera. Play as him in his final hours with this special multiplayer skin, letting you bring Hale to the battlefields R3. Then, ridicule your enemies with a throat-slashing taunt!
File size 103 KB

Champion Jockey – Music Pack 4 ($1.49)
Fourth batch of BGM you can use during the race. Listen to four tracks from the Gallop Racer series with two brand new tracks for your racing enjoyment! Hand-picked by the Gallop Racer and G1 Jockey Sound Directors!
File size 27 MB

Apples to Apples A Bushel of Fun ($2.99)
Pick up this outrageous expansion pack for Apples to Apples the video game and choose from new animated Apple Avatars, like Robot, Alien, Fairy, Barbarian and Luchador. Sample the never-before-seen Zen, Undersea, and Jungle deck skins. Challenge your friends with powerful Golden Apple Cards, including Bad Apple and Apple Sauce, and make fresh comparisons with over 500 new red and green cards!
File size 100 KB

Rocksmith – Gold On The Ceiling By The Black Keys ($2.99)
File size 2.94 MB

Rocksmith – Just Got To Be By The Black Key ($2.99)
File size 2.21 MB

Rocksmith – Mind Eraser By The Black Keys ($2.99)
File size 2.40 MB

Rocksmith – The Black Keys Song Pack (Bundle) ($7.99)
File size 7.56 MB

Rock Band 3
Build your Rock Band library by purchasing these song game tracks. For song credits, visit www.RockBand.com.

“2112: Discovery, Presentation” – Rush ($1.99)
“2112: Oracle: The Dream, Soliloquy, Grand Finale” – Rush ($1.99)
“2112: Overture, The Temples of Syrinx” – Rush ($1.99)
“Billionaire” – Travie McCoy ($1.99)
“Boy” – Ra Ra Riot ($1.99)
“Can You Tell” – Ra Ra Riot ($1.99)
“Dawn of Spring” – Christopher J ($0.99)
“Found Me the Bomb” – Buckmer & Garcia ($0.99)
“Frankenstein Teaser Trailer” – Richard Campbell ($0.99)
“I Write Sins Not Tragedies” – Panic at the Disco ($1.99)
“Panic” – Sublime With Rome ($1.99)
“Pressure” – Paramore ($1.99)
“Revenants” – The Cold Goodnight ($0.99)
“Riptide Resort” – Freen in Green ($0.99)
“Rush ’2112″ – artist ($5.49)
“Stereo Hearts” – Gym Class Heroes (ft. Adam Levine) ($1.99)
“The End of Progress” – Mystakin ($0.99)
“The Thief in the Night – Part I” – Chaotrope ($0.99)
“The Way It Ends” – Prototype ($0.99)
“You Make Me Feel.” – Cobra Starship ($1.99)
Fueled By Ramen Pack 01 ($9.99) – Build your Rock Band library by purchasing this song game album: Fueled By Ramen Pack 01 . This pack includes “You Make Me Feel…”, “Stereo Hearts”, “I Write Sins Not Tragedies”, “Pressure”, “Panic”, and “Billionaire” by various artists.

File size: 8.7 – 33 MB (singles), 141 – 183 MB (track pack)

Avatars

Just Dance 3 – Baby One More Time ($0.49)

Just Dance 3 – Barbra Streisand ($0.49)

Just Dance 3 – Da Funk ($0.49)

Just Dance 3 – I’m So Excited ($0.49)

Just Dance 3 – Kurio Ko Uddah Le Jana 2 ($0.49)

Just Dance 3 – Lollipop ($0.49)

Just Dance 3 – Master Blaster ($0.49)

Just Dance 3 – Party Rock Anthem ($0.49)

Just Dance 3 – Take On Me ($0.49)

Game Videos (free)

NBA 2K12 – Legends Showcase Launch Trailer

Battlefield 3 Back to Karkand Gameplay Premiere Trailer

EA SPORTS FIFA STREET Announcement Trailer

FIFA Street 4 Announce Trailer

Sonic CD Time Trailer

Sonic The Hedgehog 4 Episode II Announcement Trailer

Wwe ’12 Launch Trailer

Assassin’s Creed Embers Trailer

PS3 Themes

Metal Gear Solid 2 Art Theme ($1.99)

Metal Gear Solid 3 Art Theme ($1.99)

Mayan Temple Dynamic Theme ($1.99)

PlayStation Store for PSP

Bundle

Alien Havoc & Bubble Trubble Bundle ($3.99)

Blu-ray video encryption cracked using $260 kit

theENIGMATRON — Mon, 28 Nov 2011 14:04:31 +0000

When a master key for HDCP encryption surfaced last year, Intel hardly broke a sweat. It declared that nobody could use the key to unlock Blu-rays or other protected sources unless they got into the semiconductor business and "made a computer chip" of their own. Oh Mann, didn't they realize? That sort of language is like a red rag to a German post-grad, and now Ruhr University's Secure Hardware Group has produced the ultimate rebuttal: a custom board that uses a field programmable gate array (FPGA) board to sit between a Blu-ray player and TV and decode the passing traffic. Student price:€200, and no silly bodysuits required.

Hardboiled Chicken PSN Review

theENIGMATRON — Fri, 28 Oct 2011 08:50:00 +0000

What's better than a rooster armed to the teeth? A rooster armed to the teeth, with a jetpack, that's what. Ratloop's latest PSN offering provides just that, and for the most part succeeds in making it as fun as it sounds.

It's a side-scrolling platformer with a traditional find object X to proceed mechanic, interspersed with side-scrolling flying sections. The first thing that struck me is the fantastic front-end music and bold graphical style. As I started the game, I thought that was all I was going to get, but the music fades in at appropriate times to add atmosphere as and when needed. The system works well.

The graphics are good as well, as you can see for yourself from the trailer. Big, bold characters, with suitably shiny map tiles and nice mood lighting. Coupled with a fantastic hand-drawn style to the backplates on outside sections. It all adds up to a very pretty game. However, it also has some drawbacks.

First off, I should point out that this game harks back to the old school days before hardware was powerful enough to scroll levels and had to generate maps screen by screen. Why this decision was taken is anyone's guess as it was a style dictated by capability more than choice.
So the downsides of a flip-screen map are present: namely enemies walking on just as you are walking off. In all fairness though, it's never a source of irritation – just a strange design decision.

Another strange decision is to apply a warping effect on the the map layers that performs some kind of stretch as you move across the screen. Maybe it's attempting to induce a subtle parallax effect, but it just looks odd. It is quite subtle though, so it's possible you won't even notice it. But again, this doesn't detract from gameplay at all.

While the maps look nice, I did feel they also looked quite samey in places (within the same level). I often felt I was walking down the same corridoor with a different arrangement of obstacles/enemies.
This is odd as the levels can take a relatively long time to load. And at times it's not obvious where you can and can't move. For instance in overgrown areas, or where you are required to crawl through ducts.

The single screen design also means that you have to react pretty fast to enemies to avoid damage when entering a new screen. However, the gun play is very satisfying in this game. With a solid feel of connection between bullet and victim, and a juggling mechanic that has the dangerous ability to make you waste more ammo than you need to just to see them bounce.
Because the characters are so big, they need nice animations, and here the developers have delivered. And while the player movement feels animation driven, which is normally a bad thing as far as responsiveness goes, in Rocketbirds, it isn't a problem. So kudos to the developer for getting the best out of both worlds there.

Then finally, the jetpack sections (or more specifically, rocket packs). These are a welcome break from the platforming sections, and the controls are quick to pick up. However, I found the camera panning quite distracting when the game wanted to show me something and was often controlling my character off screen.
There is also a fairly steep learning curve when it suddenly throws homing missiles at you. I still to this date don't know how to avoid them, and largely find myself tanking through them to get the objective done before they kill me. But that is no doubt a fault of mine rather than the game's (assuming there is a technique to avoid them). In Smumary: + Plush graphics + Great music and sound effects + Nice feel to the gunplay and control + Jetpacks! + Interesting gameplay features – Single screen map design – Maps can feel samey within the same level – Fairly redundant stealth mechanic – Some unnecessary cutscenes – Level path can be hard to see at times

The Look: 80% Fantastic looking for the most part, with good atmosphere, can look a bit repetitive at times.
The Sound: 85% Great music, coupled with meaty sound effects.
The Feel: 70% Good feel to controls over all with levels well designed to the games strengths, but with a few issues here and there.

Overall: 76%

Author: InfiniteStates

Battlefield 3 Single Player Review

theENIGMATRON — Mon, 24 Oct 2011 04:49:25 +0000

Battlefield 3 is going to be a big game. That goes without question. I could give this game a 0/10 and it would still sell millions upon millions of copies. Luckily, BF3 is a great game with some of the best graphics you will ever see with some intense action scattered throughout the entire experience. The story aspect of the game is very reminiscent of another recent first person shooter (Black Ops) in that it starts out in a flash forward interrogation. US Marine Sergeant Blackburn recalls missions against the PLR. So, in true fashion, you go and play through everything he recalls (even moments he wasn’t there for) leading up to his capture. One downside to this type of storytelling is that where other games would give you brilliant cinematics showing tons of destruction and really cool action effects, you just get told of things that happened by Blackburn. It definitely hurt the overall story of the game but luckily, that isn’t why you play a Battlefield game. You play it for the instense action and the feeling of truly being a soldier. We’ll get to the action in a minute but first off, the game is stunning. While the game does prompt you to download up to 2 GB of HD-content, it is a must. That Texture Pack turns the game from a great looking game to an amazing looking game. Basically, Battlefield’s HD-pack works similar to what RAGE had done with big installs but big pay-off. Now, you will notice some hallways that are just not up to snuff compared to the rest of the game. Lucky for us, these moments are infrequent but still a little annoying. Otherwise, the guns look beautiful and the character models themselves are some of the best I have ever seen. The models are especially shown when you are doing a close up quick time event to kill the enemy. Overall, the single player campaign is a great experience. Anyone familiar with the franchise, or anyone who played the beta, will feel at home with the way the game handles. It feels and controls just how you want from a first person shooter and the intense action packed sequences that you experience throughout the game keep you playing all the way through. The majority of the missions are played out as part of a military squad going through various battlefields and cities that will all have signs of damage once you have left. I even found the squad based parts to e very humanizing. Injuries become very apparent at the beginning of the game and carry on throughout. You really do get attached to all of the characters you take control of. The different characters all have different outcomes to their stories. I won’t give away much but if you played the very first Modern Warfare, you know how one of people will die. As for the other guys, you’ll just have to play the game to see what happens to them. What really differentiates Battlefield from Call of Duty are the inclusion of vehicles… and less zombies. If it weren’t for those vehicles, the game wouldn’t achieve as high level of awesome as it does. You will get to take control of tanks to complete destroy your enemies which makes you feel extremely powerful. Others have you in control of jets and while not as great as the air combat from the most recent Ace Combat, are better than I was expecting from a game that doesn’t really focus on it. There are also lots of breathtaking moments that you’ll experience throughout. When you encounter the T-90 tank and all seems lost when the building collapses, is just video gaming at its best. Mix that with earthquakes happening all around and helicopters crashing into buildings and you will be visually stimulated all the way through. At the end of the single player campaign, you are left satisfied. While it is nothing ground breaking, you will enjoy it and want to replay it on a harder difficulty after you tackle the enormous multiplayer offerings. Sadly, you won’t get to replay it for a while because the multiplayer will have you playing for hundreds of hours. As with all first person shooters, the bread and butter is the multiplayer. While a lot of people were disappointed by the beta, the final product is a huge improvement. I could easily find myself playing this game for months to come and it may even let me skip over Modern Warfare 3. Being in the gunner seat for a tank or a jet in multiplayer is just pure fun. While other FPS’s don’t let you get into vehicles, Battlefield 3 wants you to jump into a vehicle and go and raise hell. DICE just really knows how to make an online multiplayer game fun. As opposed to the single player where nearly everything is scripted so you don’t get that true so of scope, it completely changes in multiplayer. While you are running between a friendly tank and an enemy tank, you have no idea if that enemy tank is going to fire on you or destroy your tank in a huge blast. Couple that with seeing jets dog-fighting in the skies above you as you are just trying to kill someone with a machine gun and you really get the sense that you are part of a larger battle. For the smaller portions of the MP, when you are in the middle of a huge battle and have to run and heal a teammate, your heart will race. Similarly, capturing certain objective points is just as fun as ever. Since the game isn’t officially released yet, the servers do reset after a few matches. While annoying, it does keep people on an even playing field when the offical release happens on Tuesday. Essentially, Battlefield 3 is an amazing game. It has a great single player experience mixed with a perfect online multiplayer experience. People have been wondering if Battlefield 3 was rushed to beat the release date for Modern Warfare 3 but this is a complete game and could end up setting a new standard for graphics on the consoles. The Good: Amazing graphics, great single player, even better multiplayer. The Bad: Rare low-res textures, nothing groundbreaking (but it’s still extremely fun and polished) Score: 9.5/10