There are good sides and bad sides to living in India, especially if you happen to be a die-hard gamer. The good deal is that almost all PC and Xbox 360 games are a lot cheaper than their US/UK counterparts. That is, if the games actually release down here before the rest of the world has finished playing them three times over. Or worse, like UbiSoft Xbox 360 titles, turn up their noses and ignore us completely.

With first party titles like Halo 3 and Mass Effect enjoying a simultaneous release with their American counterparts, it was more than a little upsetting to PC owners here that Gears of War still wasn’t available on shelves. Naturally, Xbox 360 owners weren’t too happy with the regional restrictions and extremely low content on the Marketplace. After all, Reggie’s not in the best of moods if you keep him from buying DOOM!

However, talking to our stalkers in a short email interview, the good folks at Microsoft India let us know that they are indeed working to fix said problems. According to Sanjoy John, PC owners desperate for their Gears fix will be able to pick up their copies this week, while Xbox 360 owners will see a lot of new content, including more Arcade games and Bollywood related content (blech!), headed their way.

And to feed us rabid Mass Effect hungry zombies, copies will be available with the distributors on the 15th, and in stores around the 20th. And yes, there’s probably even going to be a nice, big launch party, where some of us will be gulping down food while the sane desperate ones try to get as quickly as they can to the alien boobies! Wonder if we’ll get to see any Liara cosplayers at the event.

Gentlemen! Start your chainsaws! Microsoft, in an official press release, has announced that the hotter-than-hot Gears of War for the PC has gone gold and will be made available to retailers across the US on November 6, with Europe set to follow three days later.

As we’d noted earlier, the game will indeed bundle along all of the previously released downloadable content for the Xbox 360, including the bonus maps and the Annex game type, and five new chapters for the single player campaign. In addition to all of this, PC “pwners” will get to experience three exclusive multiplayer maps as well as a “King of the Hill” gametype, as well as being able to create their own custom content through the bundled Unreal Editor.

We’re still trying to contact Microsoft India about when this game would be made available here, but strangely enough, they seem to be dodging this one for some odd reason. With the possibility that Xbox LIVE might launch here soon enough, it’d practically be the best damned Diwali gift we’ve treated ourselves to in a long, long time. Hit the jump for the official press release while we go squeeze in some practice on our Xbox 360s.

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Life just doesn’t get better than chainsawing and curbstomping (or getting ‘em done unto you) hapless virtual characters in Gears of War. PC owners, who will experience all of this come November 6th, now have a list of achievements to go with all their fun as well. With less than a month to go, Xbox360Achievements.org have gotten their hands on the PC Achievements for the game and, disappointingly, it looks like nothing’s changed, at least from the perspective of an Xbox 360 player looking forward to the Brumak fight. It looks like they removed 10 GS awarded to the “A Series of Tubes” achievement to make space for the new Secret Achievement, which is probably related to defeating the Brumak and the new Act, but that’s pretty much all there is. We’re still not sure if the Annex mode and the Hidden Fronts map pack will be made available for the PC as well, since the 250 GS for those achievements seem to be missing from the PC version, even though the promos say that the game will include three new multiplayer maps and a new multiplayer game type. Either which way, everyone but the achievement whores shouldn’t have a problem with this, I guess.

For the uninitiated, still no official confirmation on the release date for Epic Games’ PC revitalization of Gears of War (UPDATE: Scratch that, it’s November 6th). But for those still pondering how the controls will fair on the trusty ol’ keyboard and mouse, Joystiq’s Andrew Yoon has news for you! After getting his hands-on a build from the DigitalLife Convention in NY, it seems the “A button” - which is normally used for a variety of functions in the X360 version - won’t have any sort of equivalent to it.

Double tapping a directional button will trigger the appropriate animation, such as running, dodging and taking cover. For example, double tap W to jump forward. If a wall is in front of you, Marcus will cling to the wall and automatically take cover, as in the Xbox 360 version. Once in cover mode, spacebar will perform a context-sensitive action, as indicated by the icon on screen. It doesn’t have the same fluidity of a controller, but for WASD fans, this is a perfect solution, as nothing is lost in the translation. Heck, even the “look at cool stuff” button returns as well (this time, mapped to Q).

And if even this idea doesn’t appease skeptical newcomers, all that juicy extra content could more than make up for it. New missions in the single player campaign, new multiplayer maps, a bundled game editor… the works!

Patience, Iago. Patience.

Yeah. ANOTHER Bioshock post, as if there weren’t enough of them already! But this one’s special. At least to me. Because Bioshock friggin’ BROKE my console!

It all starts off with me waiting for the game to come out, telling my retailer to hold on to a copy for me - no matter what, finally getting it and applying the patch!

Yeah, the patch. Now this isn’t a rant about the patch itself, but the utter disgust I’m feeling at the lack of proper testing before a release for a patch to a game that isn’t as impressive as it promised to be. Yeah - I can tell that after playing the 1st 3 levels.

Which brings around another observation. Gears of War used the UE3 engine, and it had problems. Bioshock uses UE3 and it has its own problems. No - not just the annoying bastard corpses that keep twitching like a dead frog’s leg being electrocuted, but I also was subjected to torn textures and clipping when viewing a certain surface at an angle! Hey 2K (wherever you are - Boston or Oz) - the last time I saw something like that was on my Diamond Monster Fusion 16 MB 3D accelerator card!! Whatever happened to “next gen”?

So now I’m pissed off because I pre-ordered Halo 3 : Collectors Edition, I’ll have you know - but now all I can do is just sit and read the manual over and over again till I manage to figure out the ending. That, or I get my replacement console by the 26th of September – which seems highly unlikely!

So if you’re reading this because Bioshock broke your console too, then here’s all I have to say -THE DARKNESS kicks ass! On a more constructive note, if you don’t already know, then here’s what to do in case you downloaded the Bioshock patch on Live. To clear the patch from the system’s cache, hold down both RB+LB (that’s the bumpers - NOT triggers) on the controller right from the second you boot your console till the 2K logo finishes. Bear in mind that you’ll need to do this EACH TIME you play the game.

Time for me to go and curl up in a corner while I sob uncontrollably.

Ahoy thar me harties!

Aye, before you start readin’ this post, I’d recommend headin’ o’er t’ har and read up a bit on the most important day (okay, it isn’t but my mind likes t’ imagine it is) o’ the entire year: International ‘Speak like a pirate’ day, shiver me timbers! (not t’ be confused with the International ‘Speak Like the Goddamn Batman’ day or the far more local ‘Walk like I’’e been kicked in the balls by M$’ day which Enoon has been celebratin’ for the past few weeks). Due t’ the utter awesomeness o’ Pirates, I was goin’ t’ ask for a guest speaker t’ come in today, but it seems the Pirate-ninja feud sort o’ intensifies at this time o’ the year meanin’ their all out busy kickin’ ninja ass. So fer now its all me! YARRR!

*coughs as he’s kicked in the nads by several TAP members*

Okay, okay, fine! Onto more serious matters then. I’ve been rather quiet recently for several reasons. I finally got an Xbox 360 and my recent time has been divided between working, studying, writing and playing GoW, WiC, SoTS, PGR3 and a few other games.

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Bobby Sandhu is sure one fine dude. Not only did he provide the layout designs for both our forums and the yet-to-go-public website, he posts on the blog whenever he gets a chance. He even designed our awe-inspiring logo! Yeah, the logo that doesn’t ever seem to get featured here. It’s just that awesome. That, or one of us is hella-lazy.

Well, he’s got another site-related project he’s been working on that’s of the funny bone brand: a series of Gears of War spoof comics. Dubbed “The Chainsaw Chronicles” - he’s done one strip so far but has a parody cover with a back-side version on the way. Be alarmed, kiddies! There’s nothing stopping the human monstrosity collectively known as the Durkaman. Don’t stop the fight!

01 - I came, I sawed, I screwed up!
Gay-ers of War Cover (links to his DeviantArt page as well)