I’ll admit I had completely missed any mention of this new Final Fantasy title before andriasang posted this trailer, and I’m a little bummed it’s not a new RPG for the 3DS. Now the invented word “theatrhythm” makes a bit more sense. The game is a rhythm/music game with scrolling dots similar to Guitar Hero/Rock Band, except it throws a track list culled from Final Fantasy’s long, long history at you.

I gotta tell ya, I’m not all that excited about a stylus-tapping game set to the ballroom scene from Final Fantasy VIII and a bunch of other cinematic and gameplay video from the series. I will concede one point, though: I got a little stoked when the boss fight music from Final Fantasy VI kicked in, and the rhythm tapping accompanied a graphically revamped battle with Ultros. That was a track that just always sounded like Go Time to me.

This is not a review of Madden 12, you can find a much better job at that just about everywhere else on the internet. I’ve barely ever even touched a Madden game, and a yearly franchise like this one tends to demand a more experienced critical eye. No, my job here is to relate what it’s been like to be a complete newb at one of the highest-selling video game franchises of all time.

Here’s the twist: I played football in college (I was a tight end), and remain an avid fan. I’m not an encyclopedic geek about it, but my Football I.Q. is probably slightly above that of the average American. I would also consider myself a fairly well-rounded video game veteran, but the last football video game I played a lot was NFL Blitz and before that, Tecmo Super Bowl. So how have I fared in Madden? I’m here to tell you that it’s the most difficult new game that I’ve ever tried to learn. And being well experienced in football means I could tell exactly how bad I was sucking. Hit the jump to read how badly, accompanied by pictures of football failure.

If you’re a Resident Evil enthusiast who’s stoked about Operation Raccoon City and looking to kill some time, then Capcom’s serving you up some interactive teasing in the form of an AR game (brought to my attention by Eurogamer). Click around for a few seconds on Umbrella Sciences recruitment site, and you’ll find all is not as it seems at first glance. But then again, to any Resident Evil fans, it’s no surprise to discover a seemingly typical pharma giant has its tentacles in all kinds of conspiracies, shady dealings, and mad science.

Anyway, you’ll soon be funneled to the website run by an anti-Umbrella activist group, from where you’ll be tasked with an internet scavenger hunt for clues that result in codes, which you take back to the heroic…uh…hackers? As the good citizens of the internet uncover clues, tidbits and info about Operation Raccoon City will become viewable. There are also vague promises of future prizes for diligent detective work. So stop pretending you’re actually getting work done at the office right now, and get started on something that’s important. The Internet needs these game details, damnit.

A press release sent from Bethesda today has revealed that “The first two add-on content drops for The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim will be releasing exclusively on Xbox 360, 30 days before it’s available anywhere else,” (check out Joystiq for the full PR text). The developer has a track record for extensive post-launch DLC content, and the scope and scale of DLC for Skyrim look to be the hugest yet (Todd Howard’s interview with AusGamers sheds some light on DLC plans).

So all you PS3 and PC Elder Scrolls fanatics who just gotta have the DLC now now now are SOL. I would be very interested to see sales statistics for moves like this, and how many multiplatform owners choose to get the 360 version instead of the PS3 or PC version, just so they can get the DLC right away. Are there really that many multiplatform owners for that to make a difference? It’s doubtful that many people who weren’t already in the market for a 360 are going to jump up and buy one just for this deal. And if the numbers don’t really yield all that much competitive advantage for the 360, then it just seems like kind of a dick move on Microsoft’s (and Bethesda’s) part.

Seems to be a lot of that going around right now.

So, I’ll totally admit to being more easily amused with movies than most people. Few were impressed by Ghost Rider in 2007, and chalked it up as another item for which to make Nicolas Cage punchlines. I found the movie to be aggressively okay – it didn’t make enough impression on me for me to remember a whole lot about it except this scene, which I found – and I don’t care who knows it – straight up badass. Put it this way, I had enough genuine, non-ironic fun while watching it that I don’t regret doing so.

Now Marvel’s churning out Ghost Rider: Spirit of Vengeance, and seeing as how I’m one of the few who didn’t hate the first one, I’m a bit puzzled as to why. They’re scraping the bottom of the barrel a bit with characters, and perhaps they want to give Ghost Rider another crack at the limelight since his first attempt came before comic book movies really started to hit their stride with Iron Man and The Dark Knight. This new movie is directed by Crank: High Voltage veterans Mark Neveldine and Brian Taylor, and while I’m grateful to io9 to bringing the trailer to my attention, I’m a bit bummed that their headline spoiled what would otherwise have been a laugh-out-loud sight gag. Just watch it before you check out the link.

You know what? Good for Nicolas Cage. Really WTF performances in WTF movies aside, I think the dude’s actually a pretty talented actor. I hope this movie is good and it scores him a few points in the public’s consciousness.

Like death and taxes, it’s inevitable that when a fan group of some storyline gets large enough, some social prankster will try to get their lulz by revealing plot spoilers before the fans have had a chance to consume the story for themselves. I don’t understand this stunt. It’s very unlikely that the prankster will get to actually see the fruits of his labor – the anguish or frustration of his victims. Isn’t that what lulz are all about? Witnessing the reactions? This is like putting a whoopee cushion on someone’s chair and then leaving the building.

So now along comes Epic to feed the trolls, and shout hilariously out the window at the pranksters who are now a block away “Damn you kids! You and your whoopee cushions! We’ll just see who’s laughing come September” After an unfinished version of Gears of War 3 was leaked and revealed some plot spoilers (NeoGAF via Joystiq), the company vowed “repercussions,” with executive producer Rod Fergusson ominously commenting in an interview with Edge “I don’t think everybody’s aware of the potential repercussions of those types of actions.”

The planned repercussions have taken some shape. Speaking to Eurogamer, Fergusson said “We have a banning system built into our stuff so we can go in and identify certain people. Some people aren’t smart about what they do. They’ll be disappointed on 20th September when they can’t get in and can’t play. They may be banned.” Does this seem like a bluff to anyone else? I’ll bet it does to the people who threw the Gears video up on YouTube, or the guy who tried to crash Fergusson’s video chat with fans to ALLCAPS the spoilers in front of an audience. If Epic can really track these folks down, wouldn’t they be pressing criminal charges as promised? Are they just going to ban the YouTube commenters who talk about the spoilers and say “Oh, by the way, my gamertag is GearsFan6969″?

Epic, your rage is only feeding your trolls’ glee. Best case scenario, you actually manage to identify and ban some aspiring social terrorist, who then wears that ban as a badge of honor and goes and plays Halo 4, Battlefield 3, or Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 3 for 2012. Brandishing the banhammer is just giving them what they want – a passionate but ultimately impotent reaction. If you feel you need to ban, do it without warning, and explain it to those who complain afterwards. Revenge is a dish best served cold.

I wonder if, years from now, we’ll look back on the summer of 2011 as a milestone not only for worldwide political unrest, but also for the scope and influence of high profile, international hacking.

So maybe you’ve seen in the news that London has completely lost its shit. Apparently BlackBerrys are popular among the city youth that populate most of the rioting groups, a fact which has not been lost on British authorities. Perhaps in an attempt to get out ahead of a possible subpoena, RIM tweeted “We feel for those impacted by the riots in London. We have engaged with the authorities to assist in any way we can.” With RIM’s cooperation, police could possibly read and record otherwise encrypted BBM messages between riot conspirators, pinpointing individuals and building evidence against them for use in court. Not a great PR move if RIM wants to appeal to privacy enthusiasts, but to be fair, their hands might be tied by the Regulation of Investigatory Powers Act.

Hours after RIM’s offer hit the web, hacker group TeaMpOisoN hacked RIM’s official blog to post a retaliatory threat (reported by the AFP via Boing Boing). Claiming to have obtained data for names, addresses, and phone numbers of RIM employees, the hackers threatened to leak them to rioters if RIM turns over confidential data to police. They sum up: “Do you really want a bunch of angry youths on your employees doorsteps? Think about it.”

I think TeaMpOisoN might be overstating its ability to focus the rage of the rioters, but regardless, RIM is the latest to lose its grip on secure, personal data in the face of a hacker onslaught. Place your bets below on who’s next to get hacked. Apple? McDonalds? The Flat Earth Society? ME?!?! At least hackers aren’t picking on Nintendo anymore, for the moment.

Now, I’m not saying Gearbox was desperate for a win, but they probably weren’t feeling so great after taking it on the chin a bit over Duke Nukem Forever. Great timing, then, for a tweet and new website confirming the development of Borderlands 2. Scheduled for April 2012, the “sequel to the extravasplosive breakout hit, Borderlands™” returns to the planet Pandora and “features all new characters, skills, environments, enemies, weapons and equipment, which come together in an ambitiously crafted story.” I hope that doesn’t mean all the former treasure hunters will get completely scrapped. Sci-fi Captain Ahab up there has got nothing on Brick if he can’t go BLAAAAUUUUUURRRRRRGGGHHH! and punch the hell out of everything.

If you’re in the respective areas, Borderlands 2 will be featured at both Gamescom 2011 and PAX Prime. Also, since I now have stuck in my head the Cage The Elephant song that will forever and always remind me of Borderlands, I’ve decided to inflict it on all of you as well. Ain’t no rest for the wicked/money don’t grow on trees…

Catherine has been a surprise since it was first announced. I was impressed first to find out that it was coming stateside, but also with the relatively high profile marketing and buzz of curiosity it got. With its M rating and suggestively disrobing anime chicks with come-hither eyes on its posters and cover art, it’s the sort of title that usually gets relegated to Japan. There, in Catherine’s native land, sexual repression collides with WTF fetish hard enough for there to be a whole market for weird games about sex. Here in the U.S., on the other hand, it represents something different, new, and ballsy: a simple action-puzzle game dropped into the context of a very adult, very Japanese, creepy, sexy thriller story.

This game is not for anyone who quickly grows impatient with non-interactive dialogue and slow-moving plot, or easily gives up when stuck on a time-sensitive puzzle that might require many attempts to complete.  Hell, I’m actually not really sure it’s for me. But that’s the weird thing about Catherine. Like the titular character, it’s a new and refreshing seductress that keeps you coming back, if only for what a unique experience it is.

I went into Duke Nukem Forever with the same sort of mindset that I brought to the Star Wars prequels – there was just no way in hell this thing was ever going to live up to the expectations born from a venerable legend fermented over a decade-plus of fond memories from an entire generation. Even with that philosophical perspective, I found the game underwhelming, although I wasn’t quite as crestfallen and hateful as most. I found some entertainment. But I can’t help but feel that my biggest disappointment with it was that it was a golden opportunity squandered. The folks who were the most stoked about the game were those who have been gamers for at least the last 15 years, people who know the industry well enough to have already been aware of the unlikely myth-made-reality path this game took to see the light of day. There was your audience, Gearbox, you had the chance to really speak to it through a legend of videogames’ history.

Now I look at the DLC plans that Gearbox has, and I’m struck by the notion that this was the general attitude they should have brought to the design of the main game, with the gameplay throwback that was Duke Nukem Forever instead being the content relegated to DLC. The four new maps especially are a sendup of the shooter tropes we all know and love. The glorious urban war zones of Call of Duty, the hellish lava and teleporters of older games like Doom and Quake, the cinematic style and peculiar quirks of Team Fortress 2, and…well, a sandbox. Guess I’m not sure what they’re going for with that one, but for the first time since before the game came out, I’m pretty stoked to see where they go with this. If done right, Duke Nukem Forever’s tongue-in-cheek, larger-than-life style could strike the perfect tone for parody – using hyperbole and absurdity to make fun of something in a way that speaks to genuine affection for the subject matter. I’m even willing to get my hopes up about it.

No release date has been announced yet, but 2K has announced deathmatches featuring the content will be held at their California headquarters on August 4th.