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A few of days ago, a team of independent game developers contacted me via email to announce their free 3D game called Picture For Truth. You play as a foreign journalist who is out to save his friend who was “silenced” from reporting and publishing articles about China’s human rights violation. This is what I call a serious game tackling real life sensitive issues.

Upon running the game, the first thing that caught me by surprise is the 3D environment. I was expecting the usual 3D graphics from today’s games but it was interesting to see it in cel-shaded style. The artwork is pretty good and has an original feel in it. It’s just a bit of a disappointment to see the game in just black and white. Some colors combined with the cool artwork would definitely spice things up.

Your primary role as a journalist here is to walk around, interact with the characters, take some photos and publish the articles for the world to see. The game is pretty short so I wouldn’t go too much into elaborating them. You just have to try it out yourself. It has some pretty interesting concepts which sparked my interest as a future game developer (hopefully haha). First and foremost, I definitely want to try and implement a photo snapshot mechanism, where the camera is able to detect certain things in the environment (Fatal Frame anyone?).

As I go through the game, I noticed some minor flaws within. Due to its black and white environment, it is hard to distinguish the areas that are considered contaminated (it looks pretty clean to me). Taking photos containing key areas (e.g prisoner) will earn you points, which will unlock some small upgrades. At times, some of the photos you take will show a key area (marked with a circle), yet all you see is a blank wall. There is also a bug present in the game, where it hangs the controls once you select the memory stick upgrade.

The aim of Picture for Truth is to expose to the general public bout the issues of human rights in China. If you kept up with the news, you will understand how heat up the issue is, especially with the Beijing Olympics coming close. The game does a good job tackling key matters which some of us might not have noticed is happening. As you might ask, all the areas and characters present are fictional.

It’s good to see a game that is fun to play yet brings about real world issues that needs to be addressed.

You can download the game free from their official website.

“I’m lying … you knew … didn’t you?”

Does the above Psyche-Lock looks familiar? Yeap you guessed right. It’s the same as the ones we see inside Ace Attorney games (Justice For All, Trials & Tribulations), triggered only when a person is hiding the truth from Phoenix Wright.

Anyway you might be wondering why is there a psyche in anime form. Seems like there’s a quiet rumor spreading about that it is a sign and proof that Ace Attorney series will be turned into an anime series. The picture you see above is supposedly one of the leaked screenshots.

“Crucial witness … or cold blooded murderer?”

Ace Attorney cases are always tied to murder cases and I guess this is no exception as well. As a fan of the series, I wouldn’t want to have it any other way. Let’s hope the producers for the anime stay true to the roots of the game. It would be extremely odd for the attorneys to battle out over cases such as a kid who stole a candy from a shop.

A new judge? Noo what happen to that old man??

To date there are still no confirmation as of when this anime will aired, although we are expecting the release date wouldn’t be far from now. Guess we just have to hang on tight until then.

Godot back in action??

There’s still one more bit of spoiler that you might want to check out. Open it at your own risk.

Click Here to Show Spoiler

My information gathering for Sony’s console is seriously outdated. Last Friday I went out to scout for the available prices and found out that the 80gb version is obsolete … kaput … nada, well at least in the terms of getting Sony’s 1 year warranty. I’m pretty sure I can still find export sets around here somewhere but no way in hell am I going to spend a small fortune and not getting a proper security in case anything goes downhill.

The prices I gathered so far was $599 for 40gb and $899 (or was it $799) for the Metal Gear Solid 4 special edition that comes with a copy of Japanese MGS4. As much as I would love to own the special edition, the extra ‘moo-lah’ will definitely put a ‘Smash’ blow to my wallet, pocket and pants, so that’s a pass. Not to mention my level of Japanese language is pretty much the “A for apple, B for boy” standard, thus it’s kinda useless to keep the jap version of MGS4.

So 40gb PS3 + extra dual shock controller + HDMI cables + a copy of Metal Gear Solid 4 gonna cost a grand total of about $800 bucks. *Cough* think there’s a need for some adjustments to be made. Perhaps I can do away without the HDMI cables for now … wait hold it. Does the standard package comes with component cables or just normal AV ones? I pray it’s the former not the later.

Anyone can enlighten me?

Sorry for the lack of updates lately. I will have more stuff up by the weekend.

In the meantime, enjoy this funny video clip. It’s actually a lot more hilarious if you played the original US version of Shenmue, the one with the very bad voice acts.

Note to RSS readers: There is a video posted above. If you can’t see it, please visit my blog directly. Thanks.

No matter how I look at it, retro gaming will never die. By hook or by crook they will somehow appear again, even after being abandoned 10 plus years ago. Take this product example, the Sega Mega Drive Twin Pad Player that is soon to be released by AtGames, Sega’s official China distributor. Not only does this dude has 20 built-in games installed, it also plays both original Japan and US region cartridges.

Here’s the list of games that are built-in;

• Alien Storm
• Alex Kidd in the Enchanted Castle
• Altered Beast
• Arrow Flash
• Columns III
• Crack Down
• Decap Attack
• Dr. Robotnik’s Mean Bean Machine
• Ecco
• Ecco Jr.
• ESWAT: City Under Siege
• Flicky
• Gain Ground
• Golden Axe
• Jewel Master
• Kid Chameleon
• Shadow Dancer
• Shinobi III: Return of the Ninja Master
• Sonic and Knuckles
• Sonic Spinball

Not exactly the best lineup but it’s has some pretty good stuff there. I always wondered why they never include Bare Knuckle (Streets of Rage) series. That is like one of the best games you can play during that era.

Going off at USD $39.90, the entire package also includes 2 six-button gamepads, av cables and instruction sheet. Not a bad deal actually, especially if you have tons of old sega games tucked somewhere in your house’s twilight zone.

While we are at the topic of retro gaming, don’t forget to check out Play-Asia’s Classic Gaming section. Who knows? You might find something interesting there.