With Sony and Microsoft engaged in sales deathmatches across India, Nintendo fans, upset at having to forage at gray market outlets for their Wiis and its games, may have some good news coming their way soon.

Eager to test the Indian gaming market for Wii titles, Milestone Interactive - one of the biggest distributors in the country, in addition to being Sony Entertainment India’s right arm - will be bringing in Alone in the Dark for the Wii, alongside the PC and the Xbox 360 versions later this week. While we seriously question the logic in field testing the Wii games market with a title like Alone in the Dark, which we feel seems to be the equivalent of testing shark-infested waters with a rubber ducky, we welcome the fact that someone is at least trying to break the iron grip the gray market has over Nintendo hardware and software in the country.

While a lot of gamers would see this as some sort of divine sign that the Wii would soon be available officially in the country, Milestone has categorically denied rumors that they will be the ones to finally tie the bell around the giant Ninny cat. According to Milestone execs, the launch of Alone in the Dark (Wii) is purely to see how well the Indian gaming market responds to Wii games being available through official channels instead of having to hunt for overpriced imports in the gray markets.

Even though HCL was originally rumored to import the Nintendo Wii for sale in India, insiders have pooh-poohed that by saying HCL was already a Microsoft partner and would not be involved with the Wii import at any time in the near future. Which, conveniently, neither confirms nor denies anything, leaving Nintendo fans to flock to modded Wiis and Play-Asia for their fix. With Nintendo never having an official presence in India, even though the GBA and the DS are hugely popular in the country (the GameCube being non-existent here), it remains to be seen whether the Japanese giant will finally see sense and follow their competitors into a burgeoning country full of rising incomes and fat, assertive kids.

I’ve forgotten how painful Xbox LIVE can be when it completely refuses to behave - a memory that was more than brought to the front again the last couple of weeks, after my Halo 3 experience sank down the drain because LIVE thought it would be really hilarious to drop me from the match when I least expected it. But to make up for all those lost days on LIVE, and to coincide with the first Xbox LIVE Arcade community awards, Microsoft had announced a couple of days back that the award-winning Aquanox-meets-Unreal Tournament Domination underwater shooter Undertow would be made available to all Gold and Silver members from Wednesday through Sunday. As announced, the game, regularly priced at 800 MS Points, is now available for free download to everyone on Xbox LIVE until Monday, 28 January, 2008 1:30 PM IST.

Now, while I appreciate the gesture, I just can’t condone the fact that this game is taking the place of a regular Xbox LIVE Arcade release every Wednesday, not to mention that the LIVE service isn’t working right even now, after a whole damn month of problems. And what’s worse is that the game, apparently an appeasement for a service that wasn’t working the way it was supposed to (10 million new subscribers notwithstanding) has a small download window on it, after which it reverts to selling for its usual 800 points. Why not run the promotion for at least a week? Wouldn’t it have been better to have users register themselves at the Xbox.com page and get 800 Points instead of having a game thrust onto them that they may already have or not really want?

And what about the Indian Xbox LIVE users who might have already bought the game? We called up Xbox Support today morning and when we got through to a rep, we dropped the bomb and asked Microsoft about what happens to people who have already paid for Undertow. After acting completely clueless about the whole thing at first, and after reintroducing us to the annoying hold music for some time, they came back and said that they would indeed credit the 800 points into our account once they verified our Download History to make sure we had bought the game before yesterday. So, if you’ve already bought the arcade game, then all you have to do is call the Xbox support lines listed here, give them your gamertags and get your 800 points to spend as you please. You lucky dogs you!

I just hate contests! Yes, I know we’re running a whopper of one right now on this very site, but it completely sucks when you can’t really win anything for yourself. And if you thought my luck held out when it came to other contests, boy are you mistaken. In any case, the guys over at Tech2, in association with Milestone Interactive, have managed to snag a 40 GB PlayStation 3 and a copy of Uncharted: Drake’s Fortune to give away to one lucky…. fellow. (See how I didn’t use extreme profanity there? I would also like to take this opportunity to thank my anger management therapist for trying to cure me of my addiction to rageahol.)

All you need to do to win the shiny, sexy black beast with the Spiderman font and the best damn game for the platform is simply head over to the contest page here, read through the three articles that contain the code, crack it and then sit back and relax and pray like hell you win. Hurry, you don’t have a lot of time left. A small tip if you want to win: hire a harem of supermodels and send them to the Tech2 Editor’s house to, erm, fortify your standing in the prize line. But whoever wins, listen up, the second I come to know you’re not a fan or you’re going to eBay it ASAP, you will get hunted down like the dog you are and blown up like a midget in a microwave. Consider yourself warned… Or you could just choose to give me the goodies and die a relatively painless death. Your call.

(Image : Copyright Unknown)

2008 couldn’t have started out on a worse note for the struggling Indian gaming community. Already reeling under problems such as delayed releases of titles (and the complete absence of others, like UbiSoft ones), game price stickers tugging heavily at our monthly incomes and less-than-average broadband connectivity, Indian gamers will now have to bear the additional burden of trying to get their game past the eagle eyes at the Indian censorship board.

Confirming the decision by the Information and Broadcasting Ministry, the Censor Board chief, Sharmila Tagore has said that they will now actively censor computer game software as well, in an attempt to keep objectionable content out of the hands of children who shouldn’t be playing them in the first place. According to DNA India, Sharmila Tagore says:

This is true that there is a proposal that the Censor Board should start censoring all video games - and I agree with proposal totally. We have already submitted our proposal to the ministry and the draft is being considered by them.

Apparently, it looks like this issue began with a number of parents voicing their concerns that their little ones were playing games that are entirely unsuitable for them. According to the proposal, the Censor Board will identify games with aforesaid “unsuitable” content and will advise age limits for children to access the videogame content. But chillingly, in a move that we are used to hearing coming out of Germany’s radical game ratings board, Unterhaltungssoftware Selbstkontrolle (USK), the Censor Board will also reserve the right to ban a videogame if it deems it unsuitable for an Indian audience.

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If you are a gamer in India, chances are that more often that not, you have come across phillistines who go, “You still play games?!” or the done-to-death quip about videogames existing for the sole enjoyment of the little ones who rush through life at the speed of six thoughts a minute. Arguably, ignorance and apathy (why, hello, Ubisoft!) are the biggest banes as far as Indian gaming is concerned, and the Counter-Strike crazed, Need For Speed laptime whoring pimply tweens aren’t really helping the cause. The world has, till now, pardon me for using a Bush-ism (or for all you Orange Box fans, a Griggs-ism), “misunderestimated” the Indian gaming scene. Whenever our articles get Dugg or make it to the front page on N4G, it doesn’t take long before comments about we not having enough money to buy Xboxes and PlayStations, being a third-world country and a whole bunch of other awesomely turdish comments start popping up, making us run for the mop. It is absolutely saddening to see gaming in India in such a sorry state, especially when you are given a nice talking-to by a squeaky-voiced teen in the Halo 3 matchmaking lobby who’s probably never known the joys of Contra and Grim Fandango.

That’s not to say that no one is trying to do anything to change this. The best example of people seriously promoting the Indian gaming scene has to be the good folks up at GamingIndians, who completed one year quite recently. (What, no cake, fellas?)

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Someone needs to put Santa Claus on the naughty list - the fat, red clown has a nasty habit of giving you a gift, but then giving a much better one to the neighbor you always hated. And it looks like Microsoft India seems bent on following in jolly ol’ Sant Nick’s fur boots as far as the Xbox 360’s pricing is concerned.

Announcing a Christmas-slash-New Year price cut for the holidays, Microsoft has said that the Xbox 360 Core console will retail for INR 14,990 along with Forza Motorsport 2 and Viva Piñata, whereas the Pro console will retail for INR 23,990 along with Forza Motorsport2, Viva Piñata, PGR3 and Yuvraj Singh International Cricket 2007 - a net savings of almost 10,000 bucks on the Core version and over 12,000 big ones on the Pro version. Obviously, now, I’ve got to swallow a whole bottle of antacids and get a squeaky de-stressing toy while people who bought the console a week or so back will probably be out buying guns to shoot themselves dead on Christmas.

One wonders whether the offer, valid until the end of the year or until stocks last, is some sort of stock clearing scheme before the newer Arcade and Pro stocks come in. Bah, who cares! You’re not going to get these babies cheaper, so if you were still mulling your purchase over, stop thinking and get your ass to the nearest game store and satisfy that burning itch with an Xbox 360 and Mass Effect.

With Crysis, every day is a cold day in Hell. And what better way to celebrate a Snow Day (or rather, Flash Freeze Day) than by sending North Koreans and distant cousins of the xenomorphs to meet their respective makers? One lucky bastard, however, will get so much more, if Tech2 Gaming have their way with the “Experience Crysis” contest. Specifically, playing it for two days straight South Park style on “the best hardware money can buy”, getting to review it on CNBC / CNN-IBN, and a goodie bag that includes a limited edition copy of the game, a six-foot (Sweet Zombie Jesus!) tall exclusive Crysis poster and an NVIDIA 8800 GTS 320 MB video card.

All you gotta do to try and be The One is to head over to Tech2’s Crysis review, spot the “hidden code” (come on, guys, you can do better than that!), send an email to Tech2 and wait and pray the rest of the competition drops dead so you’ll be picked. Or, if you’re clever (like us), you can just wait outside the Tech2 offices and wait for The One to come out, stick a BB shotgun in his face and make off with the goodie bag while he’s watering the lawn. Maybe even finish him off Condemned: Criminal Origins style for good measure. After that, maybe we’ll all use the Universal Machine Language Time Code and go back in time for some frozen pizza. Yum!