That Was the News 2008
Part 2: July to December.
October
Nintendo kicked off the month by unveiling the DSi, a new iteration of the handheld featuring bigger screens, a camera and a smack in the face for import fans. Then Reggie went on record complaining Wii Music had been made to appear "too simple" at E3. So that's the reason for the slow sales, not the fact that it's too rubbish.
Sony began the month apologising for Sackboy toy shortages, but that turned out to be the least of its problems. A song in LittleBigPlanet was found to feature two expressions from the Qur'an, leading to complaints, controversy and a worldwide recall of the game. Former Sony exec Big Phil Harrison said this was "absolutely the right decision", with all the confidence of a man who's relieved this sort of thing isn't his problem any more.
In his keynote speech at the Tokyo Game Show, Microsoft's John Schappert revealed an expansion was on the way for Halo 3, much to the delight of the three Xbox 360 owners in the audience. Meanwhile, LucasArts unveiled a new Knights of the Old Republic MMO, to the surprise of no one at all who had glanced at the internet in the preceding weeks.
In political news, Boris Johnson decided videogames are all right after all, while Guitar Hero won the US election for Barack Obama.
Yet more Fable II drama this month as the Collector's Edition was scaled down. It looked like Peter Molyneux's ambitious nature had gotten the better of him once again, as the CE would no longer include the planned Hobbe figurine, collector's cards, decorative box and house-sized mural depicting every event that had ever happened to the purchaser in their entire life. In 3D.
November
Microsoft swaggered on about Gears of War 2 being kind of a big deal after 2 million copies were sold in the game's opening weekend. Blizzard laughed in its face just weeks later, having shifted 2.8 million copies of World of Warcraft: Wrath of the Lich King in 24 hours.
Meanwhile LittleBigPlanet failed to set the charts alight, tumbling to number 19 in its second week on sale. "This is an incredibly volatile time of year and the chart reflects that," said a spokesperson, probably while wishing he worked for Blizzard.
NCsoft appeared to be keeping the faith with troubled MMO Tabula Rasa, promising new camera modes even as the game started going for under a dollar on Amazon. Unfortunately, a first-person perspective wasn't enough to save the game, as it turned out.
There were a few hiccups as the New Xbox Experience launched, but nothing serious enough to ruin millions of people's unbridled joy at getting to design yet another avatar. Speaking of which, Don Mattrick claimed once again that he invented avatars, which is about as plausible as Guitar Hero and Rock Band not being in competition with each other.
(Incidentally, Mattrick first made the Avatars claim back in July, speaking to Eurogamer, but we're reluctant to moan about people not recognising our claim to something popular when it concerns moaning about people not recognising someone's claim to something popular, innit).
Meanwhile, the expansion pack formerly known as Halo 3: Recon was given the much catchier title of Halo 3: Orbital Drop Shock Troopers. Rumours Microsoft is also changing the name of Xbox 360 to Xbox Games Machine Which Also Plays Music And Stuff are completely made up.
December
What a month for exciting videogames news it hasn't been. With all the big Christmas titles in the shops, everyone in the games industry has gone down the pub, forcing the likes of us to write news stories about Family Ski 2 and Gardening Mama.
A few interesting things have happened though. PlayStation Home launched, for example. It's all a bit late, according to Microsoft's Aaron Greenberg. But he would say that and besides, at least we didn't have to wait as long for Home to arrive as we do to play a game of pool in it.
You can always rely on the Daily Mail to stir up some videogames-related controversy. This time it's the turn of Scrabble DS to take the flack, specifically for teaching little kiddies swearwords. As everyone knows, that should be the job of the parents.
The financial crisis is taking its toll, with developers such as Free Radical feeling the pinch. If you're depressed about the state of the economy, why not cheer yourself up with Logitech's new Guitar Hero controller? At only GBP 150, it's the ideal Christmas pick-me-up for anyone who's planning on killing themselves before the Visa bill arrives anyway.
On a serious note, it seems the credit crunch could put a halt to the relaunch of the Gizmondo. "I was at one point thinking of abandoning the whole project, because I didn't see a way out of it," said visionary genius Carl Freer. NO, Carl, NO! With its inevitable raft of poor-quality Breakout clones and totally broken GPS "feature", Gizmondo is the only light that can hope to lead us out of these dark times. Happy New Year!