Hello there, fellow ninjas and warriors! This is Teemu Maki-Patola from Virtual Air Guitar Company finally returning with the big news many of you have been asking me since we first came to the PlayStation Blog earlier this year: When is Kung-Fu LIVE coming out? Well, after months of demo events across the world from gamescom in Germany to PAX Prime in Seattle, combined with THOUSANDS of cumulative man-hours for our small independent team in Finland, burning the midnight oil and sweating like crazy play-testing our game, we’re FINALLY ready to break the news right back here where we started. What better way to do that than with an all-new trailer? Have a peek at the clip below to see what people have being saying all year, and get the leg up on exactly when you too can literally step into the world of Kung-Fu LIVE and lay the smack down in your living room!

That’s right! If you’re in Europe, then you can download your way into the action on 8th December. We know it’s been a long time coming, and we’ve always wanted to get this game to you before the last of the leaves hit the ground in 2010. So, as soon as it’s officially too cold to practice your kung-fu moves outside, you’ll get an indoor option that will also transport you to a far off land of street thugs, ninja assassins, and four story-tall giants looking to bash your brains in.

So, with the launch of Kung-Fu LIVE now just a few weeks away, we wanted to brief you on a few simple things to keep in mind before you get ready to play. First off, remember, you’re going to need the PlayStation Eye camera in order to play Kung-Fu LIVE. You will also need a SIXAXIS or DUALSHOCK 3 Wireless Controller for some menu selection, and you can use up to four controllers to get your friends in on the five player multiplayer that pits one brave on-screen fighter against the rest of the players in the room.

The other thing you’ll need is a little bit of space. Remember, Kung-Fu LIVE is unlike any other game to come before it on a home gaming system. You’ll need about 7×9 ft or 2.5/3m of space to play comfortably if you’re more of an extreme fighter. Think of it like setting up a virtual ninja fighting amusement park ride in your house! Our FreeMotion technology will need to track your entire body in plain view, so you’ll also want to turn on those lights to get ready for action. That and, oh yes, you’ll want to stretch before playing to prevent aching muscles afterwards. This will truly be a workout unlike anything you’ve experienced, and will DEFINITELY be a great place to start shedding those holiday pounds. Our lean and mean QA testing team can certainly attest to that!

Thanks again to all of our friends here at the PlayStation.Blog for giving us the chance to bring you these updates, and thanks again to all of YOU who’ve been showing your support over the last few months. This project represents years of independent computer vision research and technology from our team here at Virtual Air Guitar Company, and your enthusiasm to see us finish our crazy idea for the ultimate full body motion fighting game was just what we needed to help get this game completed.

Look for Kung-Fu LIVE on PlayStation Network this December and please be sure to ‘Like’ us on our Facebook page. And before I forget, I wanted to mention our unique image export feature. You can take pictures of yourself inside the kung-fu comic book world can be export them as images straight to your PlayStation 3 photo folder, and then used anywhere you like! We’d love to see you in our game, so please feel free to post those to our Facebook page as well! Remember, our company’s motto has always been: “Serious fun for people who don’t take themselves too seriously.” When you finally get a chance to leap into the world of Kung-Fu LIVE this December, we hope you get a better idea of exactly what we mean. Have fun, play safe, and remember, “Sweep the leg!”

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I can’t tell you how good it feels to finally write that headline. The latest Real Driver Simulator is out now and I know that many of you have your hands on it already, whether you queued up at a midnight launch with the other hardcore racers or ordered from a particularly kind online retailer.

If you’ve already spent some time with GT5 or are planning a good old-fashioned all-nighter, feel free to share your first impressions here in the comments.

My hands are still a bit shaky after gripping my Logitech Driving Force GT for several hours straight, but I’ll need to keep them steady tomorrow. That’s because I’m going to be in Madrid for a lavish launch event which you can follow here on the blog via a live photo gallery that will be updated throughout the evening. I’ll also be keeping you up to speed in the comments and furiously tweeting from @PlayStationEU.

If that’s not enough GT5 discussion for you, there’s always the Official PlayStation forums. Here’s a list of current topics, courtesy of MusterBuster and the team:

• First Impressions
• The “My copy has been dispatched” thread
• “She’s my baby and I’ll always love her!”
• How to take a photo and export it to a USB stick in GT5
• Installing GT5 – the options

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Behind the facade of celebrity is where the real work begins: TV Superstars was created specifically for the new Move controllers and the PlayStation Eye. In these ‘Making of TV Superstars‘ videos you can go behind the scenes with the development team to see just how they made the game. In the first video the team talk about the design considerations behind making a ‘Move‘ game; what worked well and what was changed. In the second video, the team discuss their inspiration for the game and the mechanics of how you can become the ultimate TV Superstar, and in the third and final video, the developers talk about the way in which the game captures your facial likeness and shout-out and presents you as an avatar in game.

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Welcome MUBI‘s first monthly roundup of need-to-know news from the world of film. The month is November, which can only mean that critics and fans alike are already tinkering with their lists of what they consider to have been the best films of the year. It’s a daunting task ― so daunting, in fact, that IFC’s Matt Singer recently tweeted a little pop quiz to his nearly three thousand followers: “Finish this sentence: ‘The movie you need to see before making your 2010 best-of list is ____________.’” From the deluge of responses, he’s compiled a list of 59 films, a sort of crowd-sourced first draft of the highlights of 2010.

Funny thing, though. The film that’s probably sparked more heated discussion at MUBI than any other in quite some time ― and that’s saying something, considering that MUBI is swarming with literally hundreds of thousands of passionate cinephiles ― is not on that list. Whether or not Tony Scott‘s Unstoppable will be considered one of the year’s best a month from now, a year from now, or a decade from now, there’s no denying its potency as a conversation-starter. Check out the debates here, here and especially here.

Rather than wallow in instant nostalgia (after all, there’ll be plenty of that going on next month once awards season gets rolling in earnest), let’s take a sneak peek forward to 2011. British writer Tom Shone has already sketched out a bare bones schedule for us, so I thought I’d draw up ― yes, that’s right ― a list of what may be the best films of next year. Or at least the most interesting, going by the buzz and whispers they’re generating so far. In approximate order of the most eagerly anticipated…

1. The Tree of Life. Each of Terrence Malick‘s films (Badlands, Days of Heaven, The Thin Red Line, The New World) has entered the pantheon, either immediately or eventually. This one stars Brad Pitt, Sean Penn and Fiona Shaw and somehow combines the story of a family in a small town in 50s-era America with, well, as Pitt’s put it in an interview, “a little, tiny micro-story of the cosmos, from the beginning of the cosmos to the death of the cosmos.” Okay. In a break with his usual pace (that is, averaging about a film a decade, give or take), Malick’s already at work on his next project, which might be called The Burial and will definitely feature Ben Affleck, Rachel Weisz, Javier Bardem, Olga Kurylenko and Barry Pepper.



2. Hugo Cabret. Adapting Brian Selznick’s bestselling work of historical fiction about a boy who befriends that magical pioneer of cinema, George Méliès (creator of that iconic image above), Martin Scorsese ventures into 3D for the first time ― and evidently, it’s a challenge. Recently asked how the film’s coming along, he replied, “It’s going, it’s going. It’s an experience. The geometry of it, everything, you’re really redefining. You’re trying to figure out how to tell the story again in pictures with this 3D, which is really interesting.” That doesn’t necessarily mean he’s running into troubles, but it probably doesn’t mean he’s having a blast. If nothing else, he’s got a wide variety of star power to fall back on: Chloe Moretz, Ben Kingsley, Christopher Lee, Emily Mortimer, Sacha Baron Cohen, Jude Law, Ray Winstone and, as the boy, Asa Butterfield.

(more…)

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Sydney’s hottest party of the year – and we were there! The ‘Take 40 Stars of Summer’ party took place at Sydney’s exclusive ‘Point Piper’, with 250 celebrities and guests partying the afternoon away at a harbour-side mansion to performances by Jamiroquai, DJ Havana Brown and Dane Rumble – all thanks to SingStar!

The headline performance by Jamiroquai was set on a specially created perspex stage over the pool. The ‘hatted’ one was in fine form, performing tracks from Jamiroquai’s latest album ‘Rock Dust Light Star’ (as well as a few golden oldies). In Australia to promote the album, singer Jay Kay said “I gotta say, when we come down here… we dig it. The crowds are always great.” Everyone was certainly blown away by the performance, including celebrities Natalie Imbruglia, Sneaky Sound System’s Damon Downey, Erica Heynatz and Tom Williams.

PlayStation 3 launched new SingStar games at the party – SingStar Dance and SingStar Guitar , with plenty of guests grabbing their chance to try out the new games and give their own ‘rock-star’ performances! Among the long list of celebrities kicking back and enjoying the party were Kirk Pengilly, Justin Hemmes, Erin McNaught, Gracie Otto, Pip Edwards and Charlotte Dawson. Alex Dimitriades also rocked the event with his own DJ set which got the crowd jumping!

The event will be broadcast on free-to-air TV and subscription TV so the rest of Australia can soak up the glamour from the ultra-exclusive party.

Catch the extraordinary performance by international superstars Jamiroquai on GO! on December 12; Channel [V] on December 12; and Channel Nine on December 16. A must for Jamiroquai fans!

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