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Shop Watch July

By Russ | July 5, 2009 at 5:52 pm

Re-releases, direct downloads, and kings most little.  It might not seem much, but there are some huge things afoot in these little packages.

Final Fantasy IV: The After Years expansions for WiiWare, available for download July 6.  Square-Enix gives Yang, Palom, and Edge a chance to shine in their own respective chapters for 300 Wii points apiece.  It’s easy to to be flustered by the price, but the game itself is still a rewarding experience.

Bioshock/The Elder Scrolls: Oblivion for the both 360 and PC, street-dated July 7.  Bioshock might have included RPG elements into a first person shooter, but Oblivion is the real reason for this package to shine.  Elder Scrolls games are huge even without their expansions.  Which is good, because the unfortunate aspect of this collection stems from 2K Games’ decision to not include Oblivion‘s expansions.  Quite frankly, if Bioshock holds little interest or you already own it, the Game of the Year edition for Oblivion is the much better purchase.

Holy Invasion of Privacy, Badman! What Did I Do To Deserve This? for the PSP, available for download on the PSN July 16.  That is the last time I will ever type that full title.  Lengthy name aside, Badman! is NISA’s strategy game under much debate by some members of the gaming community.  See, the title does not have an actual UMD housing its data.  And that’s wrong.  I have no clue why a download is seen as abhorrent, but the demo was pretty fun and comes highly recommended.  See below for details on how make the download and the life shared with your PSP a little easier.

Little King’s Story for the Wii, shipping July 21.  Xseed Games keeps its deal with Marvelous Entertainment going with this late-month release.

Some Advice: Little King’s Story is generating positive reviews, but Xseed’s games tend to drop in price quickly.  The size of the game’s print run will determine it’s fate with the clearance bin.  If you’re reading this, you probably own either Bioshock or Oblivion, making the purchase useless.  It might be something to keep in mind around Christmas if you have a friend who has not played either.  The other titles are good, but as downloads the titles are not going anywhere.  Do give the Badman! demo a go if you have the time.   Here’s a step-by-step process intended to help those who think they need a PS3 to get any PSN games.

1) Buy a memory stick that has memory in the gigs.
2) Go to the PlayStation Store and sign up for an account. Remember that username and password!
3) Update your PSP to the latest firmware. If it’s too much trouble to go online and do it with the PSP’s built in WiFi, then use a game from the past few months. Or sell your PSP, because if you can’t do this you’re going to hate what happens after September.
4) Log in to the newly added PlayStation Network function at the right end of the media bar. Go to the PlayStation Store after logging in.
5) Browse.
6) Oh hey there’s a demo! Try it out.

It is up to you to decide how to pay for stuff, but bear in mind Sony uses actual money instead of points.  This fact should make calculating purchases easier.

The Future:  Mytran Wars fell into late September, and Champions Online exists in a nebula between end of this year and next March.   August belongs to the Wii and PS2 systems, while September chimes in with the multiplatform Ultimate Alliance 2.  October is where the year-end cluster of console games starts to ruin wallets.  Alpha Protocol looks like it might hit its October release, and Atlus is bringing over hellish trek Demon’s Souls in the same month. Also, Dragon Age got pushed up by a few weeks.  It is now street-dated for October 20.

All games (with the exception of those marked as street-dated or avaliable for download) will be in stores one day after their release. Release dates also tend to be shipping dates. All release dates are subject to change.

Topics: Shop Watch