We all know “Guitar Hero” is an awesome game. But at the end of the day, it doesn’t matter if you can play “Through the Fire and the Flames” on Expert — if you pick up a real guitar, you’re lost.

On the other hand, “Master of Illusion” for the Nintendo DS will teach you a real-life skill… Magic! With the new Touch Generation title, you are doing real magic with real cards. MTV Multiplayer’s Gerald Flannory took a short break from playing “Super Mario Galaxy” to see how one can become a “Master of Illusion,” and in the process he dazzles co-worker Tracey John with his newly acquired talents.

 

With E3 just around the corner, and tons of announcements to be made, we’ve put together our list of the games we’d want to see the most. The 10 biggest, baddest, most important, (and in most cases, the bloodiest) of E3 all here in one handy list for you to follow throughout the show. Strap yourselves in, it’s going to be one crazy week of games.

The list:
Halo 3
Super Smash Bros. Brawl
Assassin’s Creed
The Simpsons Game
Metroid Prime 3: Corruption
Blue Dragon
Super Mario Galaxy
Grand Theft Auto IV
LittleBigPlanet
Killzone 2

For more on each game head here, and we’ve also got trailers just for you. Think we missed something? Let us know.

You had better be ready to rock, because these cool Guitar Hero II auctions will not last very long at all.

A host of celebrities have customized Guitar Hero II controllers, and are now putting them up for auction. Artists include My Chemical Romance, Tenacious D, Buckcherry, Nickelback, Tony Hawk, and Kelly Slater, and all the proceeds from this auction are going directly to the Musicares charity.

What more needs to be said? This rocks, they painted, you go bid now.

King of Kong answers the question no one in his right mind would be interested enough to ask: Who’s better at Donkey Kong, Billy Mitchell or Steve Wiebe?

Now, for the unititiated, Billy Mitchell is like the Superman of video games. He holds high-score records in games such as Pac-Man and Centipede and was once named “Gamer of the Century.” Wiebe is the guy who broke Mitchell’s high score in Donkey Kong, which created a very real rivalry between the two.

Enter director Seth Gordon, who filmed Mitchell and Wiebe’s struggle and turned it into the documentary King of Kong. Kong will make its debut at New York’s Tribeca Film Festival in late April and will see general release on August 17th.

It’s always sort of odd when you combine wrestlers with game writers.

As part of its almost week-long Wrestlemania festivities, THQ lets a select few game journalists interview a handful of WWE wrestlers as part of the WWE Superstar Challenge. Before the wrestlers compete to see who’s the best at the video game Smackdown vs. Raw, they’re shuttled from room to room so people from Nintendo Power, EGM, GamePro, etc., can ask them such hard-hitting questions as, which Nintendo character do you most relate to? And also, what do you think of the improvements made to next-generation wrestling games? We are all sure, each of us, to win maybe five Pulitzers apiece.

But it’s good fun, and we even get a tiny bit of insight into the men and women who make up the WWE’s roster. Ken “Mr. Kennedy” Kennedy wants to make an X-rated video game. Batista who up until Wrestlemania was the world’s champion said, “I think a lot of fans live vicariously through us. You can’t go into work to beat on your boss. We can.”

Last week, THQ had its annual Wrestlemania junket wherein 50 or so game writers were invited out to Detroit, shown the latest iteration of WWE Smackdown vs. Raw, and then taken to Wrestlemania 23.

Now, although I have attended events like these a bunch of times, they still endlessly fascinate me. Not only does THQ have to manage the schedules for 50 people, it also has to plan activities solely designed to keep the troops entertained. This year’s trip saw people arriving on Wednesday and leaving on Monday, which means that everyone had lots of free time.

So. This year, THQ took the game nerds to the Henry Ford Museum in Dearborn, Michigan. The trip had absolutely nothing to do with anything, but it did have the Oscar Mayer Weinermobile, which game writers Tony “Matlock” Barrett and Chris Hoffman from the wonderful periodical Nintendo Power were kind enough to pose in front of.

Also, talk about educational, the Henry Ford Museum also had this:

(Make the jump to see this great piece of educational literature…)

Read more…

There’s nothing less interesting in this world than watching other people play video games. Unless, of course, it’s watching professional wrestlers playing video games.

Yet, oddly, the wrestling fans love it. Last week, THQ and the WWE held their annual Superstar Challenge, a contest to see which of the WWE wrestlers is the least inept at playing WWE Smackdown vs. Raw.

Wrestling fans packed the Gem theater in Detroit to watch the tournament and receive free stuff. Wrestlers such as Batista, Mr. Kennedy, Carlito, Jeff Hardy, and C.M. Punk participated in the tournament, and this guy won.

For the record, his name is Elijah Burke, and he wrestles for ECW. Go figure.

Head past the jump for exciting pictures of wrestlers playing video games.
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Dave Batista is kind of a low talker. The WWE wrestler is sitting down, talking to a bunch of game journalists as part of THQ’s Wrestlemania celebration. More than 50 of us have come to Detroit to see WWE Smackdown vs. Raw 2008 (for DS, PSP, PS2, PS3, Xbox 360, and Wii).

Batista, a very nice man, is wholly disinterested in video games. This seems odd because this portion of the event will be followed by a game exhibition where the wrestlers get to compete in Smackdown vs. Raw for the Xbox 360 and see who’s the best. Batista is scheduled to participate, will lose his “match” in roughly 12 seconds.

Right now, we’re asking him hard-hitting questions: What Nintendo character do you most resemble, how do you feel about video games, etc. And now, I’m asking him what’s the weirdest thing that’s ever happened to him in the wrestling ring, or maybe outside of it. I’m doing this because clearly, Dave Batista has already cashed his check and is out the door.

He stops for just a second. “I don’t know the weirdest thing,” he says. “But I do know [wrestler] The Big Show once farted on me when I was trying to pin him.”

We are all dumbfounded. And soon, Batista is out the door. I am obligated to report that I felt vaguely uneasy the rest of the day.

Electronic Arts and developer Harmonix (the developer recently purchased by MTV) are making preparations to rock.

Rock Band lets players take the role of a singer, guitarist (bass or regular), and drummer in an up-and-coming rock band. The kick here is that players will get to use guitar, drum, and microphone controllers to rock out either on one console or via Xbox Live 360 or the PlayStation network.

According to the press release heralding Rock Band, “The leading music publishers - EMI Music Publishing and Warner/Chappell Music - are allowing unrivaled access to their catalogs of incredible songs for use in Rock Band. The record labels - EMI Music, Hollywood Records, Sony BMG Music Entertainment, Universal Music Group’s Universal Music Enterprises and Warner Music Group’s Rhino Entertainment - have agreed to supply master recordings by their artists for use in the game.”

Oh, and the guy who’s already played an early version reports that it kicks much ass.

When I first encountered the almost psychopathically kawaii glare emitted by the female chef mentor in Majesco’s Cooking Mama: Cook Off for the Wii, I had little to no understanding of what a ‘cooking’ game could possibly entail.

Lacking the culinary skills to begin with (hey, I’m a college-kid and subsist on ramen and quick-dials to the pizzeria), it took me a while to adjust to slicing, dicing, and meat grinding.  But with a little practice, I’m no longer culinarily (is that a word?) challenged. Hey, Cooking Mama herself said that I was, “Wonderful! Better than Mama!”

In fact, I have been entered into the Cooking Mama’s Cook Off gaming competition to be held this Saturday, March 31 at the Nintendo World store in Rockefeller Plaza.  Will I aptly make the G-Hole crew proud and become a virtual iron chef?  Shall I be utterly owned by a Cooking Mama obsessive who can mince polygonal shallots effortlessly?  Only time will tell. Though I hear they’re serving complimentary deserts at the event, so there’s no question I’ll be partaking.

This Friday, March 23rd in the Year of Our Lord 2007, long-delayed PC game S.T.A.L.K.E.R.: Shadow of Chernobyl is finally being released a mere 983 years since its first appearance in the public consciousness. Historically, when a company takes almost a millennium to release a game, said game ends up being as interesting as a tour of Paris Hilton’s brain. However, in the case of S.T.A.L.K.E.R., the only thing that really feels dated is the graphical quality. Now, I could spend all day — or all blog if you will — convincing you to check out this game, but I’d rather let the experts sell ya on it. So for now, take a look at this tour of the game courtesy of the award-winning (Emmy, Oscar, Grammy, SAG Award, People’s Choice Award, Nobel Peace Prize, Harvard’s Hasty Pudding Award, and The Myrtle Beach Annual 3rd Grade Spelling Bee Award — just to name a few) videogame show The G-Hole and decide for yourself. Buh bye.

Here’s to criminal stupidity: A group of cretins recently burglarized a Texas property. The dim bulbs in question vandalized a series of cabins there, stealing more than $5,000 worth of booze.

And they photographed themselves doing so. A digital camera was found at the scene, one showing the perpetrators in their revelry.

Oh, and here’s the neat twist: The cabins are owned by one Richard “Lord British” Garriott, the man responsible for the classic Ultima series and, more recently, Tabula Rasa.

Read the story here.

Oh, and this picture was taken shortly before the burglary at this year’s Game Developers Conference. Garriott was on hand to show off Rasa in action…