Sorry about missing last night, wish I hadn’t… now I’ve got a four-in-one update to do. Ugh. Still, had to deal with a massive letdown involving work, and I just was not in the mood. Anyway, on with the show…

InFormers: Robots in the News

1. If you can’t wait until next June-August to get your hands on the Bumblebee toy from the TransFormers: Animated cartoon, due to debut later this month, you can always join in this auction. But getting ahold of it sooner’s going to cost you. Otherwise, you can just look at the pics in the meantime.
2. Also in the meantime, whether you bid or not, you can check out the package bios for Bumblebee, Lockdown, and Prowl.
3. Some new images have come up, depicting the Allspark Power Jungle Bonecrusher and Overcast toys from the Movie line.The first wave of Allspark Power is now being sighted at retail.
4. New Real Gear recolors are on the way, featuring Midnighter XR-4 and Farsight T-20, which use the Meantime and Longview molds respectively, and a green recolor of High Score 100 known as Twitcher F451….do these numbers even MEAN anything?
5. New pictures and info regarding the Movie line’s “Premium Series” can be found here. Prime with a sword and new head? Rock.
6. There’s a rumor a-buzzin’ over who may be back for TransFormers 2. Who is it? Click at your own risk.
7. If you’re in or near Wisconsin, and BotCon’s too great a trip for you, maybe DairyCon 2008 is the place for you….seriously, it’s still about TransFormers. Honest!
8. A peek at Titan UK’s TransFormers comic-’zine reveals that IDW’s Grimlock will be getting his own time in the Spotlight soon, as drawn by Marcelo Matere, artist for the Soundwave Spotlight.

Assorted Mushrooms

1. A Chinese factory who produced those toy beads has apologized for the poisonous props.
2. He-Man.Org has an update on the DVD release of the 2002 Mike Young He-Man and the Masters of the Universe cartoon series. Since there’s no proper link to the story, I’ll repost here:BCI Eclipse has released the cover image and Extra Feature details for Volume One of the He-Man and the Masters of the Universe cartoon produced by Mike Young Productions! Each episode will include the original moral segments! (never seen on Cartoon Network) Other extra features (which are subject to change) include:

   * ?World of He-Man? Documentary

   * He-Man Heroes Still Gallery

   * Never before seen Heroes Sketch Gallery

   * Audio Commentary on 5 episodes with director Gary Hartle, Story Editor Dean Stefan and writer Larry DiTillio. Moderated by Ian Richter

   * Three commentaries have extended discussions after the episode ends and have been shot in High Definition

   * Animatics of the first 3 Episodes

   * 2007 San Diego Comic-Con He-Man Panel

   * Scripts for eps 1-13 (DVD-Rom)

   * 8 Page Episode Guide booklet

   * 2 Masters of the Universe Collectible art cards by acclaimed comic book artists Ben Templesmith and Dustin Nguyen

   * Anamorphic Widescreen (1.78:1) – Digital Stereo

   Check out the cover, featuring all new art by Emiliano Santalucia! Here and here.

   Volume 1 – Coming February 19, 2008
   Volume 2 – Projected to be released in April of 2008
   Volume 3 – Projected to be released in the Summer of 2008

   In regards to a Blu-Ray release, a BCI rep has said on the forums that “The Blu-Ray will not be coming out at the same time. We have some features that take advantage of the BR tech and they are going to take longer to produce. We don’t have a street date for that one yet.”

   Thanks again to He-Man.Org for all the great info, I can’t wait for this one to come out.

3. Batman vs. Terminator? Not exactly, though it’d be cool if this inspired it, after that whole Batman vs. Predator run.
4. GameSpite has us covered for what releases this week in DVDs, games, and anime.

Video Power

1. The Cap*Community US blog and “Top Secret” (the Bionic Commando site) are offering fans of Mega Man a chance to win a special autographed, handdrawn picture of the Blue Bomber by Keiji Inafune himself.
2. Smash Bros. DOJO!! has four, count ‘em, four updates waiting for us today!Starting the week off in rather unspectacular fashion (remember, the game was originally supposed to come out Monday. No “apology” update of anything really good, unfortunately) is a telling of how the Friends List feature works, followed by some returning Pokemon.

   Tonight’s update was a little more substantial, as we got some music from a Japan-only Game Boy game, the predecessor to Star Fox known simply as X.

   Sakurai also talks a little about battling for the Smash Ball, which reveals that Final Smashes can be turned off (to the relief of some), and in some cases, if you loseWeight Exercise enough times, you can revive on the field with a Final Smash already set to go, so you can help even things up a little.

3. Three new additions to the Virtual Console this week, none especially noteworthy. There’s ZANAC on the NES, Eternal Champions for the Genesis, and The Dynastic Hero for the TurboGrafx16, which is basically another version of Wonder Boy or Adventure Island.Are any of them worth the money? Well…

   Plus, get the skinny on Asteroids on Xbox Live Arcade, too.

4. Ok, not to trivialize the whole situation with Jeff Gerstmann, but I’m lumping it all together here. And for those not wanting to give GS your traffic, these are all links to AMN or other sites, given the general boycott and all.The remaining GameSpot editors have spoken out about the situation via podcast, and rumor is that there could be a major staff exodus. They’ve officially announced Gerstmann’s departure, while denying that it had anything to do with advertising, and a freelancer has given his two cents on the NeoGAF forums.

   Eidos, meanwhile, has been caught red-handed in falsifying review scores in ads for the game in question, while Gerstmann tells Joystiq what he’s legally able.

   Other websites have done other things to show their support, as well.

   Now, it seems that CNET Vice President and Editor-in-Chief Jai Singh has had enough and is performing a little investigation.

   If you’re wondering why this is such a big deal, and why there are so many links talking about it, here’s one more as Ars Technica explains.

5. And I’ll be honest, without any irrefutable proof, I’m a little iffy on the whole boycott thing.
6. Activision and Blizzard have announced a merger, and as a result, stocks have soared. Now that they’re bigger than EA, it seems they’ve decided to adopt one of their strategies, though they say the merger will not affect quality.EA says “bring it on.” Now them’s fightin’ words!

   For those interested, here’s a complete FAQ on the merger.

7. Missed out on The Orange Box because your console of choice is a PS3? No worries, your version comes out in a week.
8. Bioshock downloadable content is now available.
9. Over in the UK and here in Canada, Xbox 360 owners can finally start catching up with the rest of the world (US, anyway) with their Marketplace.
10. Back over here, at least in the US, Xbox has initiated a sort of Arcade Hits program.
11. Remember that news that the original NiGHTS Into Dreams was coming to PS2? Well, forget about it, unless you’re good to import.That goes double on a Wii version.
12. The dark side of GameTap is revealed as a few major publishers have ended contracts with the company, resulting in the loss of about 70 titles.I kinda feel a little bad for them, given they just made their “1,000 titles” announcement.
13. Hope you don’t like playing Monster Hunter or Resident Evil: Outbreak online TOO much; the online segment is finished come the end of the year.
14. Cool, a new Twisted Metal game for the PS2. Sort of.
15. Looks like the beam katana gameplay in No More Heroes can get pret-ty messy…In addition, GameTrailers has treasure hunt, sinister villain, and subway showdown gameplay, among others.
16. Nintendo is looking to improve release time between non-Japan countries globally. I’m glad to hear it, and this should really benefit Europe and Australia, as noted. Here’s hoping other companies follow suit.
17. At EB/Gamestop locations, if you can’t get ahold of a Wii, they’re supposed to give you one of these.Um… thanks?
18. Looks like the need to get Rock Band guitars repaired isn’t all bad…
19. An MMO fighting game? Now there’s an idea with some potential. And to play as Ken or Chun Li is just icing.
20. Some good news and bad news about the upcoming Ghostbusters game.

–LBD “Nytetrayn”

This entry was posted on Wednesday, December 5th, 2007 at 8:15 am and is filed under The Daily 'Shroom. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.