Majora's Mask Remake? Or Just Cruel Joke On My Heart?

TERRIBLE FATE

You decide...

Zelda Fan? Then You Need To Watch This!

Oh my goodness guys, I haven't been this excited for a Zelda game in years... And there isn't even one announced or anything! This video, made by the amazing people at Game Trailers documents the tale of the Legend Of Zelda, in its entirety, and in correct chronological order for the first time. The information wasn't ever given out by Nintendo until recently, but FUCK is it ever incredible!

Aside from being incredibly interesting, remarkably illuminating and just downright captivating, the video is also fantastically well made. It's around 40 minutes long, so get your dinner ready, and sit in front of your screen and you're in for a treat. Obviously, spoilers for all the games in the Legend Of Zelda series, though I hadn't played Skyward Sword and wasn't upset at all by having it spoilt. A truly awe-inspiring story, and an amazing piece of media by Game trailers, this deserves to be savoured. Enjoy!

Timeline

The THQ Humble Bundle Is Something You Should Buy Right Now

Company of Heroes, Darksiders, Metro 2033, Red Faction: Armageddon and Saints Row: The Third for whatever you want to pay. It feels redundant to even recommend it, but even if you don't have a PC that can run these games (yet) just freaking get them! Pay £0 if you want, just make sure you have them in case one day you get yourself a sick ass PC! And I should also add, please don't pay £0 for them, it's a sale for charity, that potentially gains THQ no money. Just give a little, especially because the present for paying over the average is Saints Row: The Third, arguably the best game in the bundle.

As of right now, if you pay £4 you get the lot. You can't argue with that!

The THQ Humble Bundle - Pay What You Like

You literally can't afford to pass up on this deal!

Fuck You Hitman: Absolution

The game just erased my 12-hours-in save inexplicably. What a cunting load of shit. Cunt off Hitman, you cunt.

'The Greatest Video Games Music 2' Snubbed From Official UK Classical Music Chart

Video game legitimacy is something I hope we're all looking forward to, to the day when "I play video games" won't result in you getting looked down upon, as it arguably does nowadays. The industry has been making babysteps towards this reality for years with the Wii and DS being recent examples, but every so often we're reminded of just how much prejudice exists towards our beloved hobby.

One such incident occurred last week, when The Greatest Video Games Music 2 album was completely overlooked by the Official Classical Album Chart here in the UK, despite being a fully orchestrated album performed by the London Philharmonic Orchestra, and conducted and devised by recognised composer, producer and musician Andrew Skeet, an individual who has been an orchestrator on Ridley Scott's Robin Hood and Garth Jennings' The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy. The album made it to 1st place on the Classical Album section of the Official Billboard Chart just last week, but continues to be overlooked by the UK equivilent.

The reason for the album being overlooked seems to be unexplained, though Mark Robins, administrator and creator of the "ClassicVGMusic" Facebook group, which is an advocate for the legitimacy of video game music which you should all go and follow right now, had the following to say:

"What we're saying is we can't understand why compilations of orchestral movie scores are accepted as classical when video game scores aren't - there's no logic to it. They talk about the official soundtrack chart, but that doesn't actually exist. When the Billboard chart - the biggest music chart in the world - happily accepts this as classical it just makes the UK chart look archaic in comparison."

The problem seems to be in interpreting one of the charts rules which determine what is and isn't eligible, the exact wording of the rule is this:

"The works should be composed by recognised classical composers and/or in a publicly recognised classical idiom or form."

While I may interpret that to mean that orchestrated music, no matter what the basis should be allowed to be recognised, but apparently the people over at the UK chart company just don't see it the same way. By their logic a classically composed album, orchestrated by one of the most respected orchestras in the world does not qualify, simply because it is based upon music which has appeared in video games. The real sting in the tail here though, is that the exact same logic does not apply when film socres are concerned, in fact, the CURRENT number 1 album in the classical album chart at this very moment is this album of, yep, you guessed it, a musician's own interpretations of songs which have appeared in films entitled: 'Magic Of The Movies', the first tack of which is a version of 'My Heart Will Go On'  by Celine Dion, not even originally a composed piece, but a pop track. The heart bleeds!

The refusal to even acknowledge some of the video game world's finest compositions as "classical" is a rather large slap in the face, but there is hope yet. Classic FM, the premier radio station with which to hear classical music here in the UK, recently had a show entirely dedicated to the first 'Greatest Video Games Music' album and it was incredibly popular. The show treated the music with respect and helped enormously to spread the creativity and beauty of some of the great music we've come to know and love as gamers. The radio station even has a section of its website now dedicated solely to video game music, a tremendous step forward.

So while there has been some good out there, the refusal to say "Hey, this album that was the best selling album in the world was orchestral, maybe we should be paying attention to this?" is ridiculous in every way, and prejudices like this NEED to have a light shined on them to raise awareness and combat the problem. I can see a day not too far from now where the original soundtrack to a game can be released on its own merits and reach the top of the album chart, but not while organisations like this sit back and ignore them. Do your part by following the ClassicVGMusic Facebook and Twitter, and staying up to date with the latest big news in the genre of video game music. It's a beautiful medium that is screaming to be recognised, and if you need proof, check out this amazing rendition of 'Far Horizons' from Skyrim, as performed by the London Philharmonic Orchestra, as featured on the 'The Greatest Video Games Music 2' album, to see what you should be supporting.

'ClassicVGMusic' on Facebook
'ClaccicVGMusic' on Twitter
Video Game Music featured on Classic FM's Official website

Football Manager Player Gets Actual Real Life Football Manager Job

This is fucking mental. FK Baku, a Premier League team in Azerbaijan whose reserve team have been without a manager for 2 years, have hired somebody for the job full time, based on how good he is at Football Manager. Azerbaijan-born Swede Vugar Huseynzade was hired as an assistant based purely on the strength of his Football Manager experience. That's pretty incredible by itself, but then when you learn he got the job ahead of Marseille/France legend Jean-Pierre Papin, a guy who's more than paid his dues for a job managing the reserves!

This is hardly going to set a precident among actual football manager positions, but the fact that it happened even once warms my heart like the after effects of 8 Big Macs. Fucking brilliant. Oh, and FK Baku are the Azerbaijan champions.... So yeah, wrap your head around that!

Who'd have thought they were actually grooming us for managerial positions this whole time!!!

Sale: GOG.com - Pick your Own Bundle For $10

Just a quick post to let you all know about GOG.com's current promotion, allowing users to pick any 5 games from a list and pay a total of $10 for the lot, saving around $50! Now I'm not sure if they'll translate that straight into pounds so you'll pay about £7, or if they'll just turn it into £10, but either way, this is a good deal! Games you can pick from include Alan Wake's American Nightmare, Torchlight and Trine, so have a look and see what bargains you can pick up!

GOG.com - Pick Your Own Bundle For $10

Not fucking bad for $2!!!

Mirror's Edge 2 Is A Thing That's Happening

In response to claims that Dice was working on becoming more than a "Battlefield factory". The statement was echoed by Ben Cousins, a former Dice employee, who gave insights via an interview with OXM on Dice's goals:

"It is general knowledge in the Stockholm dev scene that Mirror's Edge 2 is in production at DICE. It's important for us [to take creative risks] - the DICE guys are roughly 300 people in the Stockholm studio; not all of them are working on Battlefield things, and that's intentional, because we don't want to become a Battlefield factory."

"The minute we start saying, 'You're going to make a Battlefield game for the rest of your life', they're going to go some place else. So for them to make great Battlefield games there need to be other things for them to do as well. That's why we have people who move around quite a bit. And then obviously we have a boatload of people that just want to make Battlefield because they love it."

"Same thing with the team in San Francisco that are making Dead Space. It's a stunning team and they're passionate about what they do, and they love making Dead Space. Then the answer's, 'Well, then make Dead Space'. Then we have to figure out how to sell it and make it successful."

A very understated confirmation of Mirror's Edge 2, but confirmation nonetheless! That'll make a few people I know very happy.

Somewhat of a cult classic, the original Mirror's Edge was flawed but good in a lot of ways, a sequel could potentially be something really special.

"It is general knowledge in the Stockholm dev scene that Mirror's Edge 2 is in production at DICE," he said on Twitter.

The comment was in response to an interview by EA Games vice-president Patrick Soderlund, saying that DICE is more than just a "Battlefield factory" and is working on other projects.

"It's also important for us [to take creative risks] - the DICE guys are roughly 300 people in the Stockholm studio; not all of them are working on Battlefield things, and that's intentional, because we don't want to become a Battlefield factory," he told OXM.

"The minute we start saying, 'You're going to make a Battlefield game for the rest of your life', they're going to go some place else."

Read more: http://www.digitalspy.co.uk/gaming/news/a439860/mirrors-edge-2-in-development-at-dice-says-former-battlefield-lead.html#ixzz2CteNtwp3

GTA: Vice city Coming To Mobiles December 6th

Yes, that's right, classic game GTA: Vice City will soon be playable on your iOS or Android device, for the slim price of £2.99 for iOS and £3.72 for Android. The release will mark the 10 year anniversary for the game, and will coincide with Vice City Anniversary-themed collectibles being released. I've played the mobile version of GTA 3 and, while it controls like garbage, it's incredibly impressive to have literally the whole game just on my phone. I see no reason they won't do the same for Vice City, though the thought if them cramming all that content onto just my phone blows my pathetic little mind. I can see myself buying this, playing it once and then never touching it again, but it'll be worth it just to be as impressed as I know I'm going to be!

Vice City is much beloved, here's hoping it holds up!

Nintendo Fuck Up Wii U's Launch

There's no easy way to say it, Nintendo fucked up. As if it wasn't bad enough that they released a day 1 patch that can allegedly 'brick' consoles (DON'T unplug it during the 2-hour patch download), they completely missed the mark as far as their online implementation. It's no surprise that Nintendo are new to all this online business, but it's almost as if they're deliberately being obtuse with it all. Nintendo Network IDs will be tied to the console itself, which on the surface doesn't sound too bad... Other than the fact that all purchases, saves and settings tied to that account will be completely unavailable on any machine but the one the ID exists on. Your Wii U breaks? Fuck you. Wanna play at your friend's house with your account? Fuck you too. No explanation on why this decision was made, but this is equivilant to having a mobile phone that only makes calls, it's just archaic.

We live in an age where you can transfer a Blu-Ray quality film off a pc, onto a phone, onto a tablet, over wireless to a laptop, onto your television, all super easily. It has to be that Nintendo have made a fundamental decision to do things archaically, because making shit like that work is easy nowadays. Either that or it's just laziness, and personally I'd rather believe that Nintendo were being stupid, rather than just lazy.

"Congratulations dawg!... Maybe be careful connecting this to any kind of internet though..."