Valkyria Chronicles 3 Fan Translation Makes First Release

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Christmas came…on time apparently. The group behind the fan translation of Valkyria Chronicles 3 has put out their first release on Christmas day. Its not complete, but at least about 90% done. It is only compatible with the Extra Edition that can also be patched with a copy purchased and downloaded from the Japanese store. Further instructions and the patch itself can be obtained from their website.

The release has gone off to a slightly rocky start due to some ISO patching issues which have since been fixed, but congratulations to the team for keeping the project going for it’s dedicated fan base.

Yogscast May Have Slipped About Ryo Hazuki in Sonic Transformed

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Shenmue 3 still isn’t a thing, but the Yogscast may have revealed S0L’s surprise a little early. During their recent stream around 40 minutes in they had a character select screen that looked larger than normal, and of all the faces to be on there besides Simon was none other than Ryo Hazuki as seen here, and went so far as to have him in a race.

He isn’t steering a forklift but he’s riding an arcade cabinet playing OutRun instead. I assume it’ll transform into WaveRunner cabinet on water and an After Burner II cabinet in the air.  No dates have been revealed or any other details, but Sega fans can rest assured that their demands for more Ryo and more SEGA stars are indeed being met.

UPDATE: Or maybe the hovercraft mode is Ryo riding a Hang On cabinet to keep in theme with the works of Yu Suzuki.

Retro Community Day for PC Version of Sonic Transformed Today


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Watch the aftermath of what we did instead of watching the VGX. It involves Yogscast, Sonic Adventure DLC, bad Sonic rap and more for six hours.

Its free weekend for Sonic & All-Stars Racing Transformed on Steam once again and its Saturday night, which means its time for another Retro Community Day. We’ll be kicking off at 5 PM central with the return of the pre-game show the hour before. You can expect Yogscast DLC characters to appear. Of course its either this or Pewdiepie on VGX. It’s your choice really.

Start sending in your friend requests to VidyaRetro on Steam now! We’ll periodically send out requests to join a two round game for each person added to the friends list. See you there!

Review: The Typing of the Dead Overkill

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Droppin’ F-bombs like a mother…

The original The Typing of the Dead was a misunderstood sleeper hit when it came out for the Dreamcast. The keyboard accessory may have been useful in the eyes of consumers for games like Quake III Arena, but it didn’t immediately become apparent that a typing game spin-off would make for an amazing, fast paced alternative. The original game appeared in Japanese arcades prior, and when it arrived on PC shortly after it had done well enough to spawn several more sequels and updates on the platform, in Japan. Outside of Japan it would be seen as an outdated arcade game that would be shunned, yet had become the cult hit which emitted an outcry of diehard fans in their never ending list of seemingly implausible demands for a new entry in the series. Years later, after SEGA and Headstrong’s release of The House of the Dead: Overkill on the Wii, it had seen an update with The House of the Dead: Overkill Extended Cut on Playstation 3 and on the week of Halloween has seen an update on Steam for PC as part of a semi two game bundle, literally out of the blue with no fanfare and nearly cancelled by now defunct Blitz Games. Despite these hurdles, it was still the ideal platform to put out this modern update to the franchise that encompasses its cheesiness and over the top absurdity to much higher levels, probably higher than people would expect or possibly want.

Vidya Retro Streaming Feature of House of the Dead


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With the release of Typing of the Dead Overkill on Steam, we get to take a look at it along with other games in the House of the Dead series.

Update: Our livestream is over, but you can expect the Retro crew including Bartman3010, DavidTL, Overlord, Perfect Chaos Zero, GeneHF and Guess Who looking at several titles including The House of the Dead III, The House of the Dead 4, Zombie Revenge, and several random mobile games as well as The House of the Dead Overkill – Lost Reels, and the horrors of the mine cart in Sonic 4 Episode 1. 

Ikaruga successfully greenlit for Steam

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Today’s Steam Greenlight round up features 37 games that have been voted on by the Steam community, and for Ikaruga fans can rejoice as the game was among them!

There is currently no release date set, and there is no other news about this version other than what is already known, however the developer, according to their official Twitter, has expressed interest in adding more of their games to Steam.

There are already games by the developer on Steam such as Dynamite HeaddyGunstar Heroes and Alien Soldier. However this is their first attempt at self publishing on the service.

More as it develops.

Treasure’s good news is Ikaruga on Steam Greenlight

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Back in late September, it was reported that Treasure was going to bring good news for fans of Ikaruga. Which turns out to not only be a port of their arcade game, but that it would be the developer’s first foray into Steam Greenlight. While this means they require fan demand for the PC version, they promise to deliver on an updated version of the Xbox 360 release which also includes XInput controller support.

Head on over to Steam Greenlight if you’d like to see this game, possibly along with their other titles, on their service. Maybe this could also lead to Guardian Heroes or Bangai-O on Steam?

 

Rhythm Thief Now Available on the Nintendo eShop

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Rhythm Thief may have become one of the more obscure 3DS titles to hit store shelves, but SEGA has made it easier to get a hold of the title by releasing the game on the Nintendo eShop starting this week and is retailing at $19.99 in the American eShop while priced at €44.99 / £39.99 in the European eShop. Quite a difference in price between the two regions. This joins Sonic Generations 3DS on the eShop as part of Nintendo’s initiative to put up titles for download that were made available prior to their push for retail games on the eShop.

If you want more information on the game, be sure to hit up Shigs’ review of the 3DS version here.

 

A Look at Elusive Dreamcast Titles on Vidya Retro


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This week on Vidya Retro we look at what could have been after the passing of the Dreamcast as we take a look at unreleased games and other elusive Dreamcast products as well as a pre-show look at the Android version of Sonic & SEGA All-Stars Racing.

Games covered include released and unreleased Dreamcast games, as well as games running on commercial and homebrew emulators through Dreamcast such as Half-Life, Bleemcast! with Metal Gear Solid, Propeller Arena – Aviation Battle Championship, Wacky Races, Fur Fighters, Sam & Max: Hit the Road and Doom II – Hell on Earth.

Commentators include Sonic Retro members Bartman3010, TimmiT, Overlord, Cinossu and David the Lurker. Listen as they trudge up old Dreamcast information from the US Dreamcast magazine and guess review scores for Dreamcast games.

SEGA Sammy Acquires Atlus owner Index Corp. for 14 Billion Yen

segatlusNikkei reports that SEGA Sammy Holdings has succeeded in the bid war to acquire Index Corp. This means the company now completely owns Index as well as it’s subsidiaries including Atlus Co. Ltd. All assets and properties will transfer ownership by November. Appearance of Atlus property to appear in Sonic & All Stars Racing Transformed? Still up in the air, but suffice to say, Atlus is now going to be part of SEGA’s growing empire. SEGA is certainly no stranger to the company as they have assisted in publishing Atlus titles in Japan. Surely though, the most important news is they can collaborate once again to make a true sequel to the hottest Dreamcast title, Maken X.

We will report on more as it develops.

More Dreamcast Games On Vidya Retro Livestream


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The stream is done for the day, despite technical difficulties. The stream is embedded in the video above which features gameplay from Sonic Adventure 2, Jet Grind Radio, Unreal Tournament, Soulcalibur, Dynamite Cop, Spider-Man, Sonic Shuffle, Ready 2 Rumble Boxing, Looney Tunes: Space Race and South Park: Chef’s Luv Shack. 

The Dreamcast is still thinking this month with another set of hits (and misses!) streaming live on Vidya Retro which should be underway if you’re reading this. Be sure to talk with other fans in the Twitch channel and for any particular requests you may have.

Dreamcast Livestream with Vidya Retro


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The stream has ended, but the entire three hours have been embeded above for your viewing pleasure. We’ve gone through Sonic Adventure, Typing of the Dead, Power Stone, Space Channel 5, Rayman 2 – The Great Escape, Crazy Taxi, Sonic Shuffle, and Quake III Arena. Featuring commentators from Sonic Retro: Bartman3010, Gene Fujimori and Overlord.

What better way to celebrate the birthday of the Dreamcast with a live stream? Vidya Retro will be streaming starting at 5PM Central taking a look at some of the biggest games, hardware and more with SEGA’s last major console.

Creative Assembly and Extra Credits Want to Teach You About Roman History

When I was at this year’s PAX Prime, I tried to see if I could play Total War: Rome II to write up a preview for a genre I’m not terribly great at. After a few seconds it quickly dawned on me that the time I was going to invest wasn’t going to do this game any justice. I’m not a guy who does great at Real Time Strategy, nor did I come from an education system that would span further from Texas history. However, through some of their marketing money, Creative Assembly has teamed up with the folks behind Extra Credits to give you an overview of Roman history through a series of videos starting today on the Punic Wars. If you’re playing the game and don’t understand everything the story of Rome II is telling, this ought to help provide a better understanding, or for people like me, its great to see developers doing some good to go to new efforts just to teach people about history. That and, well, probably to make sure this doesn’t happen again…

Still its great to see efforts like this happen between the two, and its great for SEGA to even allow their marketing money to be used in this form. Be sure to watch the video and stay tuned to the Extra Credits Youtube channel for more on Roman history.

PAX ’13 – Heroki Demo Impressions

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At this year’s PAX 2013, SEGA is hitting it off with another indie developer under the SEGA Alliance brand. This time lending a hand to a developer from the Netherlands, Picomy Games, to release their action game Heroki to iDevices. I was joined in by two of the developers, Michael Balm and Bobby Bouman, as well as SEGA Alliance producer John Eternal as they showcased a build running on an iPad to help explain the game mechanics and provide some insight on the development on the game.