I always enjoyed Left 4 Dead but I never really found it terrifying, not even a bit scary, until the Teletubbies came. Left 4 Teletubbies is a L4D mod made by Flameknight7, which replaces zombie models with the Teletubbies, complete with the ‘he-ho’ sound those horrid creatures made. With a few gory zombies left for ambiance this mod turns L4D a lot more sinister and, I have to admit, a bit startling to play.

Now if they’d only substitute the Tank for Barney, the Witch with Baby Bop and the Hunter with IT the clown, we could call it a day and be done with many childhood frustrations.

The zombie apocalypse was never so wonderful as when Luis Armstrong composed this song based on it. An avid zombie hunter that Mr. Armstrong, you know? It is in fact quite well known among zombie-hunt historians that Luis Armstrong would go out at night singing this very song while shooting zombies in the head with a hunting rifle. His favorite weapon, thought? His trusty trumpet fitted with explosive darts. Jazz was never so deadly.

[Wonderland]

It’s no secret I hold a special place for the survival-horror genre, specifically the Silent Hill series. There have been some bastard children from the franchise, but it still maintains a good fright-fest with a reasonably developed storyline. So when it was reported Konami was going to remake the original, fans were expectantly up in arms with an arsenal of questions. Would it be a straight up remake?  A re-living through a familiar character? Why do this to such a well established classic?

Thankfully, producer Tomm Hulett helped ease some fears pointing out that Shattered Memories will not be a remake, rather a re-imagining. The full interview is on Joystiq. Set for an ambiguous release, Fall 2009, for both Wii and PS2 (with a possible launch on the PSP); I’ll be interested to see how this actually plays out.

Some choice quotes from the interview:

Where do you draw the line between messing around with people’s expectations and completely jumping the shark? There’s a lot of differences, but I wouldn’t say we jumped the shark, because they’re all very calculated, they all serve the story and they’re all surprising.

He’s the guy that’s always there for Silent Hill [Akira Yamaoka]. Every single Silent Hill game, no matter whether it’s The Room, or Homecoming, Akira’s always there. Could you make a Silent Hill game without him? I wouldn’t like to, because I am a fan of the series and I do love his music. I think it adds a special element, it’s kind of the atmosphere of the town. If Akira’s music isn’t there, it just doesn’t sound quite right.

Is it more difficult to make something feel really scary on the Wii — just because I think survival horror games are very dependent on the production value and graphics and sound. …we’ve done some amazing things graphically here. Every object self-shadows with the flashlight that you’re moving around in real time, even the snow flakes. …What we’ve done with the Wii version is you’re interacting with the Wii remote. With puzzles, you’re not coming to a separate puzzle menu where you select options with the cursor, you’re reaching into the game so you’re immersed at all times.

[Joystiq]

Last week Nahu posted information on HVS upcoming title, The Grinder. Ben Kuchera from Ars Technica sat down with the development team and Mark Sheppard, voice actor and front showman for The Grinder, during E3. With an expected release of late 2010, the game is still in its infancy stage, but the playable demo looks very impressive for being made in 2 months and the final release may contain support for the WiiMotion Plus. The Ars post highlighted an angel investor is funding High Voltage, leaving them to develop and innovate (which it shows) and not stress about finding a publisher. HVS is producing at least two other titles, The Grinder and Gladiator AD, building on the same technical innovations used in The Conduit (to be release June 23rd).

Not wanting to raise my expectations too high, how this developer is leveraging the Wii technology is raising my anticipation for their releases. You can expect a thorough review of The Conduit later this month.

[ArsTechnica]

The Horde is back and now it brought friends. Left 4 Dead 2 was announced today to the total surprise of everyone. Its bigger, better and brighter, with a lot of the campaigns now taking place in daylight. Set in the southern United States, this game is composed of 5 brand new campaigns which are now finally intertwined in a bigger story. Here’s what we know.

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The Wii is getting some really great news still a week before E3. High Voltage Software, the studio behind The Conduit, announced two new titles for the Wii this week. The first title is Gladiator AD, a roman-era fighting game that, while visually impressive for the Wii, it’s still a pretty generic fighter as far as we know. The second title is called The Grinder and this one will really get you excited.

The Grinder, in few words and many generalizations, is Left 4 Dead for the Wii. A multiplayer first person shooter where you battle against hordes of zombies, vampires and werewolves with a sadistic AI that directs every move of the horde. The game is shooting for a grindhouse movie style very much in the vein of movies like From Dust Till Dawn which should mean over-the-top characters and gore everywhere. As with The Conduit, High Voltage Software has put the Wii’s hardware limits to the test and so far it looks pretty good.

There is however one big problem I have with this game, and with L4D for that matter. There seems to be no plans for split-screen multiplayer, only online. What happened to actually playing with your friends in the same room? Enjoying co-op fun without having to lug around your console and a screen to play on wherever you go used to be the norm. Now more and more it seems to be the exception. Dear Gaming Industry: some of us still want to play local co-op with games that don’t force you to operate toy music instruments.

EDIT: While finishing up this post I found out the game DOES feature split screen multiplayer. I swallow my words, they are delicious.

[IGN]

The Zombie apocalypse is coming my friends! The Swine Flu is only the beginning, panic is already setting on the streets and it surely wont be long until the virus mutates and its victims start rising up from the dead. While naive soccer moms go out and buy mouth masks and Lysol by the pallet you know that the only thing that’s left to do is head for higher ground, the sea or at least your nearest mall. You’ve stocked up on water, food and weapons, lots and lots of weapons. However You’re gonna need something to do while you wait out the boring part of the Zombie apocalypse and can finally head back out and kick some undead ass. You’re gonna need games!

Luckily we’ve got you covered! We’ve taken some time out of barricading DDN HQ to pick the 5 best games for waiting out a global pandemic. These games will not only entertain you but teach you all you need to know to defeat the Zombie Horde and restore human civilization.

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I’ve just gotta put this out there before you proceed to watch this trailer… It’s amazing. It’s epic. It will remove any doubts you had about this game that the playable demo may have placed in your mind. And it’s a tiny bit spoilerific. Press play dammit! Press it NOW!

Let’s get down to business. The female figure in the coat. Who is she? A great deal is pointing towards her being Jill Valentine. But, wasn’t Jill shown to be dead in a previous trailer!? Not necessarily. All we saw was a tombstone. No body. Plus, dead don’t always mean dead in Resident evil. The hooded figure’s voice sounded EXACTLY like Jill’s. And then you have Wesker saying what he said to Chris at the end of the trailer: surely its got to be Jill. There’s every chance that Jill indeed did die. But who is to say Jill’s body wasn’t experimented on, resulting in her resurrection? Or perhaps her T-virus infection during the events of Resident evil 3: Nemesis wasn’t completely vaccinated, there-by bringing her back to life! I’m leaning towards the hooded figure being Miss Valentine. But there’s also every chance it could be Sherry Birkin or Claire. I’m hoping Capcom throw the most gangsta curveball ever regarding the hooded lady’s identity.

Resident evil 5 is already looking like it’ll be one of the most plot driven games in the series since game 2. It could also be the one game to potentially bookend the entire Resident evil saga. But it probably won’t. Capcom will keep spinning this shit off for as long as possible. Day-of-release-purchase most definitely.

This trailer is available on the Xbox live marketplace. So those of you with Xboxes and Live accounts, go download this to watch it in all it’s HD glory…over and over and over until March 13.

Resident evil fans will probably know a fair bit about Resident evil 1.5. The game that almost was Resident evil 2. The game was 80% complete and had a release date and everything, until Capcom decided to scrap it all and start from scratch – resulting in a year long delay. Some original ideas were kept, but most of 1.5 went through some drastic changes: The overall setting and many of the locations were kept the same but went through cosmetic changes, the main playable character of Elza Walker was ditched entirely in favour of Claire Redfield, the character models had their detail lessened to allow for more zombies on screen and a couple of the boss battles were removed. Check out this video of the game in its scrapped glory.

The lack of door opening animations should’ve rolled over into the final game! Why’d Capcom leave those in?! Resident evil 1.5 looks pretty crap to me. The graphics in this version were supposedly superior to Resident evil 2, but I can’t see it myself. I think Resident evil 2 was a much better looking game. The rendered environments were much more detailed. Everything in 1.5 looks too blue, too clean and untouched.

I think Capcom made the right decision to scrap the game and start from scratch. The end result was a fantastic game and a stand out in the series. Resident evil 2 is my personal favourite Resident evil game and I rank it as the best of the bunch. As brilliant as Resident evil 4 is, there’s something about game number 2. It featured the best intro and ending, was essentially 2 (or even 4) games in one and it was the most plot driven of them all. I still live in the vain hope that Capcom re-make it as they did the original for the GameCube. I even would’ve settled for a Resident evil 2 scenario in Umbrella chronicles, but Capcom dashed those hopes and dreams of mine without a second thought.

It’s a shame that so much went into 1.5 for it to just be scrapped. Capcom could probably release it via Microsoft, Sony and Nintendo’s online stores and milk it. I personally wouldn’t pay to download and play it, but I’m sure an army of Resi fans would. These same gamers went about bought Gun survivor and Outbreak. I’m sure they’d snap up a bit of gaming nostalgia and a collectors item.

[PlayStation museum via Kotaku]

Year Released: 1994

Genre: Survival Horror

System: PC (DOS)

Producer/Developer: Pygnosis Ltd and Andrew Spencer Studios

Hear ye, hear ye, come oneth, come all! Psygnosis Limited, producers of yon great titles such as Lemmings and Wipeout, doth indeed launcheth a title mixing both the elements of fantasy and the genre of horror with a technology unheardeth of in the early 1990s.

Uncover your ears, the butchering of the Shakespearean speech has ceased. Hit the jump for heck of a lot more.
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