GCA 2008 has come and gone and we are still pretty much disappointed that we could not be there to cover the event. However, the Experience EA event in our very own backyard in Mumbai more then made up for it, what with it’s healthy dosage of upcoming AAA titles like Mirror’s Edge, Need For Speed: Undercover and FIFA 2009 bound to put a smile on the grumpiest of the gamers.

Held at the Hotel Trident in Mumbai, we got to try out many of the games that were featured at the recently concluded Game Convention Asia 2008 held in Singapore. One of the games that have had everyone spell bound for quite a while now, besides giving rise to endless debates on whether the Third Person View of the First Person View is the better choice is Mirror’s Edge. DICE, at the helm of the game, has done a radical turnaround from their award-winning Battlefield games to a totalitarian world which Faith, the game’s protagonist and other Runners like her inhabit. After having watched countless videos of Faith soaring through the roof tops, it was quite an exhilarating experience in itself to be given the control, of which we made some good use, a couple of hard landings notwithstanding.

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Hot on the heels of the Bangalore Human Weapon Gaming Night, comes the Delhi edition of Human Weapon Gaming Nights. To be held at Cafe Morrison on 26th September, you can start trooping post 6 PM to have your shot at winning Xbox 360 and other assorted goodies. If nothing else, like us, you will at least get to down as many cans of Red Bull as you want. Strangely though, unlike the Bangalore event, there doesn’t seem to be any registration page indicating any one can drop in any time. Smart move, we would say. It always better to conserve precious bandwidth for more…*ahem*…constructive purpose. So that leaves us with only one question: What does the “206 weapons per warrior” mentioned on the invite mean?…Owww, never mind. Should have paid more attention in my Bio class.

(Image originally posted on GamingIndians. Just where does he get his boy-ish charms!)
It’s pretty much a known fact that the best way to promote a product or service is to get it endorsed by celebrities. So whether it’s Paris Hilton endorsing an anti-alcohol campaign or Robert Downey Jr. on a “Just-say-NO!” campaign, brand-power will rule! However, and thankfully, we’re talking a little closer to home. And of course, at home nothing is bigger, badder and bling’ier than Bollywood.

After the failed attempts of Yuvraj Singh and Akshay Kumar to make the Xbox 360 a household name (yes – most people still think that the PS2 is the latest gaming console), the Xbox 360 is now a prominent feature in some of the latest Bollywood movies! I recently had the opportunity to see this in 2 movies to smack audiences in the face, in recent times – the abysmal turd called LoveStory 2050 and then Bachna Ae Haseeno, both clearly featuring the Xbox 360 console and games (although the concept of gaming in 2050 was as boring and uninspired as the movie itself).

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For all those who think anything that has got the word “history” in it will be dull and boring, The History Channel seeks to change that with the recently concluded Human Weapons Gaming Nights. Held at The Living Room in Bangalore, it pitted gamers against each other in Halo 3 while others tested out their button-mashing skills in Ninja Gaiden 2. Sadly, contrary to what the press release had promised, Gears of War was missing, leaving GeOW veterans dissapointed and having to contend with getting their collectives asses handed over to them by the Halo 3 crowd. The winners walked away with Xbox 360, t-shirts and other assorted goodies. Rest of the crowd had to make do with Red Bull, the co-sponsor of the event. But hey, it was free, so we are not complaining. A certain Mr. Ramadoss would sure be proud of us. With no one from Microsoft present to answer our burning questions about Gears of War 2 and Fable II, we will have to leave you guys with some pictures from the event after the jump…

…and a friendly reminder to the parents of the kids in the picture above, to keep a watch on what the kids are playing.

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Xbox 360 owners rejoice! Microsoft India’s Product Manager Sanjoy John (GamerTag: MAGN0LIA) today confirmed on the official Xbox forums the dates of three of the most anticipated titles coming to the platform respectively.

Fable II: October 22nd 2008
Fallout 3: October 28th 2008
Gears of War 2 (Both Standard and Collectors Edition): November 7th 2008

Unfortunately, we still don’t have any clues as to when the PC and PS3 versions of Fallout 3 will arrive here (if at all), understandably because Microsoft India’s only concerned about their own console version and that seeing them bring the PS3 version would seem both awkward and hilarious (hilarious mostly for us). For now, it’s all up to local distributor e-Xpress Interactive.

Thanks to KeyFox KeyEffects Keyofx for the info. Who’s my bestest fwiend? Dat’s wight, you aaare.

Too Human… ah… the game that was once supposed to be the Xbox 360’s big launch title, the game that was once supposed to come out on the Playstation on four discs, the game that was supposed to change the way we look at action games. Yes, there are a lot of things Too Human was supposed to be, and that’s where the problem lies because Too Human is not a bad game by any means, it’s just not the legendary title that most people expected it to be.

Let’s get some of the misunderstandings out of the way first. Contrary to what you may have heard, Too Human was not in development for ten years. Yes it was supposed to come out ten years ago but the Too Human we are playing today is not the same game. The project was put on hold while Silicon Knights churned out great games like Eternal Darkness, Metal Gear Solid: Twin Snakes and Legacy Of Kain.  This Too Human has been in development for a maximum of three years. Silicon Knights also had to build a new engine from ground up because of the whole debacle with Epic Games forcing them to abandon the Unreal 3 Engine and start from the scratch.

With the history behind us, let’s get down to the actual review.

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Right on the heels of 50% off weekend offer on Portal, Valve come sup with some more good news and this time it’s the turn of the Xbox 360 owners to celebrate. Taking a leaf out of Battlefield: Bad Company’s book, Valve has confirmed to 1up that Left 4 Dead on the Xbox 360 will have dedicated servers on Microsoft’s Live online service.

This news has brought a lot of cheer in the console community as many believe that’s the way forward, especially when we are paying close to USD 50 for Xbox Live annually. Dedicated servers translates into a better online experience with Left 4 Dead, especially when co-op happens to be the USP of the game.

Read the complete article to get some more juicy news about the game and a sneak-peek at the achievements.