I hate using the word “better” to describe a game. For a while now, I’ve wanted to move it onto the trash heap alongside “good,” “bad,” and “important,” words that sound audacious but don’t actually describe anything. That’s the trap I’ve laid for myself, so let it be said here, if nowhere else: Wii shooters are better than the rest. Full stop. Hopefully you haven’t snapped your mouse in rage while reading that. If you have, I promise to try and tell you just how and why so that loss won’t have been in vain. If by the end of the next page I haven’t convinced you that Red Steel is better than Halo, then I will promise never to use that opaque and self-affirming word ever again.

Back before Nintendo had turned its swaggering Revolution into a neutered Wii, Red Steel was the macho dreamboat that seemed ready to transform the shooter genre. A new level of aiming precision, gestural control, and a noir-ish Yakuza tale made it seem like videogame combat was about to evolve again. Then Nintendo sold their soul to Martha Stewart’s version of SkyNet, and something called a “bounding box” entered game vernacular, while those awesome-seeming sword fights turned out to be imprecise and ruled by cheating half-motions. On those grounds, Red Steel was largely written off as a failure, a buggy mess that proved all the general promise of the Wii remote was underwhelming in specific execution.

You can read it here,

Also, Pixel Lab have announced the World of Love igdc(indie game development conference).

Pixel Lab have announced the World of Love indie game development conference. Taking place in London, UK, on June 25th, the event will be host to some of Britain’s (and Ireland’s!) greatest indie talent.Several guest speakers have already been announced: Terry Cavanagh of VVVVVV fame, Rolando creator Simon Oliver, Sean Murray of quartet Hello Games and the illusive Stephen Lavelle aka increpare. It’s going to be like a huge, UK indie love-in.

The event is being hosted by none other than Channel 4, who have clearly have caught the indie gaming bug. Tickets are on sale now for £65.00.

via Indiegames.com.

And that raps it up for today!

The new and very rare engine by nerfodestiny, it is up for a limited time so download it now while it’s out!

Andrew Brophy is an indie game developer who is a member of The Poppenkast and the founder of The Braingale Team.  You can view his personal portfolio here or his blog here.

Introduce yourself:

Introduce myself? Okay, here it goes, although I can’t remember much, so sorry if this is a little vauge…

It all started in 1993, where I was born in the fifth worst city in this country on the fourth month into a family of three, being the second male child and the only one who cares for games. Sometime after that, I started making them – and fun ones at that!

Also, I’m Andrew Brophy from Australia.

How do you come up with the ideas for your games?

All sorts of ways. I have this bad habit of coming up with the look of a game first, so I’ll make all these nice looking effects, then sit there for ages trying to figure out how on Earth I turn it into something playable. I’d like to think I got that right a few times.

You can read the interview here.

It also appears that the PSN has had some wide spread errors

SCEA is looking into widespread reports tonight of PlayStation Network login errors causing many left unable to play games, and even lose trophies, on certain PlayStation 3 consoles.

“We’re aware that many of you are having problems connecting to PSN, and yes, we’re looking into it,” the company said in a statement. “Stay tuned for updates.”

Forum members and e-mail tipsters are saying this problem is primarily affecting owners of the older model of the PlayStation 3, and is even causing users to lose trophies previously earned. Many titles, such as Heavy Rain, are also now unplayable due to connection issues with Sony’s servers.

Read the rest here.

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“Broxter is an indie game developer from England, whose work includes Blockiliate and Ne Touchez Pas! Flash.  For more of his work, you can visit his (outdated) personal portfolio here.

Introduce yourself:
Hello. I’m known as Broxter (real name, Jack Brockley). I’m a seventeen-year-old student from Stoke-on-Trent in England. I’d like to think that I’m pretty intelligent. Alas, I use Twitter too much.

How did you begin making games?
I found Game Maker in February 2006 after reading a tiny paragraph about it in a UK magazine which I still read, called GamesMaster. At first I found it very difficult to use and it wasn’t until August 2008 that I finally finished my first game (which was featured on YoYo Games after being entered into the third competition) and began using GM regularly; I think this was the point when I became decent at making games and I was pretty happy with myself.

You have recently made the switch to flash. How was that and do you have any tips for others wanting to do the same?
Indeed I have. I’d been wanting (and trying) to make games in Flash for about a year. The main attractions were the possibilities of reaching so many more players (such is the nature of games run in a browser) and actually making some money. After attempting and failing with both Flash CS3 and the Flixel AS3 library, I basically gave up. I heard FlashPunk was coming but I was expecting it to be just as tricky to use as Flixel. How wrong I was. I completed the beginner’s tutorial on the first day of FlashPunk’s release and subsequently fully ported Andrew McCluskey’s Ne Touchez Pas! from Game Maker to Flash in just three weeks.”

You can read the full interview here.

Also, Apparently Fable III the third upcoming game in the fable series could piss us off,

Molyneux recently revealed, “We’re making some announcements about Fable III and […] it’s going to really upset people. I’m really scared when I go out and tell people what it is they’re going to get super pissed off.”

Again this can be read at IGN

And lastly, Some news on NerfoDestiny’s new game, Light! Light is still in production, but that does not seem to stop sequel ideas from rising. “When I first made Light I wanted it to just be a simple platformer, and I had gotten some positive comments, so I continued to make Light, But out of nowhere I scratched it, I decided to make it an open world style game,  making it possible for many endings, so now I have many ideas for sequels to those endings.”

This concludes today’s news.