The piece is obviously going to last a very long time and is a great tribute to the series. This is a rather fitting monument according to Namco Bandai Marketing Director, Lee Kirton, who gave the reasoning behind this venture by saying “the Soulcalibur characters are among the hardest fighters in gaming – so we’ve decided to immortalise them in granite for thousands of years”.

The work was carried out by expert Stone Engraver, Göran Andersson, the last remaining engraver on Sweden’s west coast doing work out in nature. Andersson said that “this is the by far most complex and detailed engraving I have ever performed. But it was very fun to do.”

It seems you should have plenty of time to go see this somewhat legendary piece of advertising if you’re ever in Sweden! Don’t forget also that SoulCalibur V is out right now in the US and tomorrow in Europe!

The writer discusses possible theories about the source of this unexpected altruism, including a compulsive need to be providing input or base tribal instincts to defend territory as a group. I think the cause is much more basic.

DICE has figured out the appropriate way to encourage teamwork and selflessness. Stuart cites the simple act of reviving a fellow teammate while under fire, which not only puts the player at risk, but could ruin that all-to-important Kill-Death ratio that is the staple of FPS bean counters. But see, this ignores one key element of the Battlefield 3 experience.

Killing an enemy is worth 100 points. Capturing a command point and converting it to your own, or destroying an M-COM objective will net you 200 points. Reviving a team mate is worth 100 points… the same base amount as a kill. It should also be noted that you don’t lose points for dying.

But who cares about points? On the surface Battlefield 3 is a standard modern day multiplayer FPS. However, Battlefield 3 is actually an action role-playing game. As you take part in various battles, you gain points for certain activities. These points unlock better weapons and equipment in various categories. These are no ordinary points, sir. These are… EXPERIENCE POINTS! And if the endless stream of Battlefield and Call of Duty games has taught us anything, it’s that people love unlocking weapons and equipment for their “character,” not to mention the programmed response most gamers feel at unlocking achievements and ranks.

Through careful tuning of point values and unlockables, DICE has found the holy grail of today’s gaming community. They seem to have correctly incentivized teamwork. Not only that, but this has had the secondary effect of causing most players to be generally civil and helpful to each other. This flies in the face of the well known “online disinhibition effect,” otherwise known as John Gabriel’s Greater Internet F**kwad Theory. Just about every major multiplayer game from Unreal Tournament 2004 to World of Warcraft has been rampant with this kind of behavior.

Thank goodness a developer has finally figured out a way to mitigate the seemingly unending tide of internet stupidity. So, what’s the next step? That’s a good question, but if the gaming industry stays true to form, we can hopefully see other developers copy, borrow, and steal from DICE’s pinnacle of team-based gameplay.

Now the caveats: US only, Flash Player 10 required, and the free stream ends at 11:50pm PDT on January 27. Check it out here – http://www.warnerarchive.com/theater - while you still can. Hardly seems worth the trouble. Once this stream expires, it’s back to YouTube for your streaming Pac-fix.

Seriously, why that hat?

The workout will be available at the GYMBOX in Westfield, London, running every Tuesday night at 7pm throughout February. There’s no need to worry about signing up for membership, either, as it’ll be open to members and non-members alike, giving participants the chance to learn the moves of Mitsurugi and Pyrrha, among other fighters from the game, whilst also getting a cardio and muscle workout.

Furthermore if you want to continue your workout beyond these classes, anyone that shows a copy of Soulcalibur V – released 3rd February – will be able to get membership for GYMBOX without paying a joining fee, saving £99 if you sign up during February, making it the perfect time to pick up a copy of the game and get into shape. More details can be found on the GYMBOX website.

And if that all seems like a bit too much effort … well, remember that Namco Bandai will also be hosting a launch event for the game on 4th February.

The mammoth NES game pad comes in at 12 feet long – 30 times that of its standard equivalent – and weighs 18 stone. This £4000 device was crafted by Ben Allen, a British Engineering Student, who described his work as “a labour of love”.

Commuters have been able to actually use the controller to play some classic NES titles. In the Guinness World Records Gamer’s Edition 2012 you can read more about this mega construction and other gaming accomplishments.

Via CVG

But let’s face it: video game scores barely make a ripple in the mainstream arena.

Case in point – voting for the Classic FM 2012 Hall of Fame is now open – every year it features great pieces of classical music from the greatest composers in history along with fantastic movie scores, but has never featured any orchestral tracks from video games. Mark is campaigning heavily to reverse this frankly disappointing state of affairs and is urging gamers to vote for Aerith’s Theme from Final Fantasy VII.

And before you discount the campaign as completely hopeless, just remember: we managed to get Rage Against The Machine to Christmas number one against all odds.

“What I’m imploring you peeps to do is help by “liking” the Facebook page, following the twitter feed and, most importantly, taking a minute out of your day to vote – and, indeed, vote for any bit of commercially released bit of orchestral game music you like, just so we can pack the charts out with something we can all relate to.

“I’m hoping that everybody who does vote chooses Nobuo Uematsu’s “Aerith’s Theme” from Final Fantasy VII for at least one of their choices so we can really push it up the chart.

“Why that bit of music? No hidden agenda – because it’s nice and a fan favourite and one I’m sure people would happily vote for,” says Mark.

Links:

Facebook: Get Video Games Music into the Classic FM Hall of Fame Facebook Page

Twitter: @ClassicVGMusic

TO VOTE: www.classicfmhalloffame.co.uk

Although Classic FM is a UK radio station, voting appears to be open worldwide so don’t let geography stop you from lending your support to this brilliant cause. Voting closes on February 29th 2012.

That changed when he got his first teaching gig. In surveying 3 different classrooms of nine-year olds, Call of Duty Modern Warfare was a surprisingly popular choice, and correlated with those students that also had what MacKinnon called “problematic behavior.” Unlike most people who fit into the category of “people who refer to video games as murder simulators” MacKinnon stops short of drawing a direct cause-effect relationship.

The root cause of misbehaviour is multifaceted. Bullies aren’t simply mean people; they often suffer from their own issues at home or elsewhere. Violent games aren’t necessarily the cause of misbehaviour, but they can serve as an indicator of other things.

In my experience, there is a range of attitudes toward videogames from parents. There are no hard-and-fast rules determining who possesses which attitude – they can be young, old, single or married, but their gaming views don’t especially follow a pattern. However, where children are distant from their parents, violent videogames often seem to find their way into a child’s life.

It’s clear that, once again, the role of parents is the most important factor. So, don’t let your five-year olds play Grand Theft Auto IV!

Adrian Picardi directed and edited the film. And he is no novice when it comes to videogame fan films. Picardi was a finalist in the IFC Films Assassin’s Creed film contest for a short film based on the game. The six-minute film, titled His Final Hit, can be viewed here. And if he managed to pull that off with a budget of only $150, then I trust his retailer-backed Left 4 Dead film will be a great one.

Left 4 Dead isn’t the only Valve game to inspire what looks to be a great one. Earlier this year, an epic Portal fan film circulated the Internet with ridiculous speed. And based on what we’ve seen so far, it looks like Picardi’s Left 4 Dead film has the potential to do the same. The release date for the full fan film hasn’t been announced yet, but Airsoft GI promises it’s coming soon.

Via Destructoid.

However, my most recent trip to Redbox went down a strange path. It all started with me looking for a Redbox that had Modern Warfare 3 inside it. Considering the demand, I knew it might be a tough task to pull off, but I had all three days of a long weekend to pull it off. Thankfully, I did find a copy at a location that was in the area of where I needed to run some errands, so reserve it I did and away I went.

As always, I went to the box, slid my card, grabbed my disc and was on my way, family in tow. However, halfway home, my son mentioned that the disc inside the Redbox case was not a disc, but a photocopied piece of paper. I had been put in the middle of a scam. I immediately started thinking of how long my morning would be as I was going to have to call Redbox, explain my story and hope that they would believe my tale.

Surprisingly, the phone call was not half bad. The representative, Rose, was nice enough, and because only one other person had rented that title before me at that box, it was easy to find out who pulled off the fraud. During my phone call, I inquired about the fraud rate, and while it was not super high, it did seem to go up with high profile titles like Modern Warfare 3. It seems no one wants to steal Nicktoons MLB, when they could have Uncharted 3 or Modern Warfare 3.

Redbox in the end hooked it all up and got me my refund, and even threw in a couple of free rentals to boot. For a company that I thought was going to leave me out in the cold, it took care of me fast and reliably. Kudos to them. As for the moron that rented the Modern Warfare 3 game day one and thought they could pull off the fraud of the century. Apparently the joke is on you or your parents as they will now be billing you for the complete game. Sometimes, I question the intellegence of some people when this sort of stupidity comes into play.

Here is a picture of the disc that I got. Yep, that is a black and white photocopy of the front of a Modern Warfare 3 disc, complete with the barcodes for Redbox on it.

The new Tomb Raider is coming to Xbox 360, PS3 and PC in Fall of 2012 from Square Enix and Crystal Dynamics.