Joystiq [PlayStation]

The Oklamahoma Sooners power forward, and AP player of the year, Blake Griffin will be gracing the cover of EA's NCAA Basketball 10. Even though he's headed to the NBA in this year's draft, Griffin's time in the NCAA will not be forgotten, making him a great choice for the game's cover. If it were us, we'd probably have toned down the airbrushing, though.

It looks like Paul McCartney, Ringo Starr, Yoko Ono and Olivia Harrison have more to do with The Beatles: Rock Band than thrilling journalists at Microsoft's E3 media briefing. In an interview with Crispy Gamer, the game's lead designer, Chris Foster, intimated that the former Beatles, along with Ono and Harrison, have shared quite a bit of input with the team at Harmonix.

Foster calls the group "the shareholders," and states that they helped put together the song list, its venues and gave input as to whether the game's "dreamscapes" adequately supported the songs. "They looked over all the characters, the animations ... they really kept us honest on whether we were capturing the spirit of the band as they were performing, which was a huge challenge for us," says Foster, noting that it's necessary to capture the joy that The Beatles expressed when playing.

According to Foster, seeing the former Beatles and their widows at Microsoft's E3 briefing "is about as validating as everything." He adds, "They don't get together for almost anything ... it has to be something important, something they believe in."

Capcom is still worried about all of this Swine Flu business, apparently, as MTV Multiplayer revealed that the company will not bring Dead Rising 2 to upcoming PAX (or Games Con, either). Instead, Chris Kramer, senior director of communications, revealed that the next glimpse of the game will be at the Tokyo Game Show, in late September.

We tracked down Kramer ourselves and asked him what the deal was. He said he couldn't provide us with anything other than to expect something on the game around TGS. We further inquired why the title would be missing PAX, but Kramer remained tight-lipped. We have a feeling the game is skipping the show because Capcom is still worried about all of this Swine Flu business, and not because Dead Rising 2 is a bad game or anything. Duct-taping chainsaws to dirtbikes and killing zombies with them sounds like the opposite of bad to us.

When it was first revealed, we gave Silent Hill: Shattered Memories a bit of a cold shoulder. Gone was the established story that had first introduced us to the world's creepiest town, reinterpreted with altered characters and a new otherworld that ditched darkness and rust in favor of jutting glaciers and vaguely menacing snowflakes. Thankfully, our experience with the game at E3 revived our expectations, even if it was at the expense of whole memories.

We later had the opportunity to speak to producer Tomm Hulett, who elaborated on why we should call Shattered Memories a re-imagining -- and not a remake:

You're making Silent Hill: Shattered Memories and you're tying it to the first game. Harry Mason is back, but you're calling it a re-imagining, you're not saying "remake." Is that a bad word?

Right, that's a curse word. [laughs] By re-imagining, like you said, we've got the premise of the first game: you're Harry Mason, you're looking for your daughter Cheryl. Beyond that we've changed and updated it, so it's an entirely new experience. If you've played the PlayStation game to death, you still have no idea what to expect for Shattered Memories.

We did that because, on the Wii, maybe there's a lot of people who haven't played any Silent Hill games, so it wasn't really fair to say, "Here's the sequel to Homecoming, enjoy yourself." But then, returning fans, they've played the first game, they've played Origins, they've seen the movie, and they've played Silent Hill 3 and it all kind of revolves around the events of the first game. So they wouldn't really want to play a remake and so, by re-imagining it, there's new content -- if you've never played it before, of course, it's new to you -- but then, there's also this extra layer of new content if you're returning, because you get to experience all these things that are different from what you're expecting. And that really fits the theme of Silent Hill, which is this place where your reality is subjective and you don't know what to expect. We've built that into the game if you're a returning fan.

Continued →

Have you killed thousands of mindless soldiers lately? No? Then let KOEI fill in that void with yet another Dynasty Warriors 6 game. PSP will be getting a new version of Dynasty Warriors 6, based on the PS2 game of the same name. The enhanced port will include ad-hoc multiplayer, new costumes and Meng Ho from the newly-released Dynasty Warriors 6: Empires.

The PSP game is currently only announced for Japanese release, but a US release is likely. KOEI has released almost every Dynasty Warriors game in the States, with a notable exception of Warriors Orochi Z.

Jack Black returns for yet another episode of "Brutal Thoughts." The weakest episode so far explores the "wild" world of roadies, courtesy of someone named "Meatbones." The punchline ... is rather mediocre. There's no Schafer in this episode, and even Black looks like he's phoning this one in. Give it a watch, and then relive the (much better) previous installments here:

• Tim Schafer electrocutes Jack Black on video
• Jack Black pumped for 'that Brutal Legend movie'

The artist who helped inspire the graphic style of the Wii and PS2 versions of Ghostbusters is angry for being omitted from the game's credits. According to a blog post by artist Dan Schoening, Sony and Sierra -- the original publisher of the game before it was picked up by Atari, following the Activision/Blizzard merger -- "100% guaranteed" he would be credited for his help in shaping the final look of the two versions of the recently released title. "For a game that in many ways is heavily influenced by my work, is it too much to ask for some acknowledgment?," Schoening wrote over the weekend.

Yesterday, Red Fly Studio (the team behind the Wii/PS2 versions) CEO Dan Borth defended his company's position to Kombo. According to Borth, many people responsible for the game were omitted for the simple reason that there wasn't enough room. "After Sony, Vivendi, Atari all got their credits we had few spaces for ourselves and the others who worked on the games with us -- Zen Studios, War Drum studios, etc," Borth said. "Many people didn't make it and they worked many, many more hours on this game than Mr. Dan I can assure you. Does that make it right? No it doesn't. That's just how it played out.

Borth admits that Schoening's name was omitted, but is adamant that it was not done intentionally. While not having "space" for the artist's credit is one of the saddest attempts at an excuse we've ever heard, Borth apologized to Schoening for the omission and thanked him for his work on the dev's official blog.

[Via TrueGameHeadz. Image credit: Dan Schoening]

According to Siliconera, Capcom has just released Rockman Complete Works, a PS1 enhanced version of Mega Man 1 on the PlayStation Network. The problem? It's impossible for you to get. To celebrate the very-late PS3 release of Mega Man 9 in Japan, Capcom is holding a contest for those that purchase the game. Winners will be able to get either a free t-shirt, or a downloadable version of Rockman Complete Works.

We're certain Capcom won't restrict the release of Rockman to just this Japan-only contest. We wouldn't be surprised to see each and every Mega Man game released on PS1 to get its inevitable PSN re-release. Let's not forget, Capcom promised a lot of downloads this year ...

According to a new GameStop listing, PS3 owners who want to purchase the downloadable Marvel vs. Capcom 2 will have the option of purchasing a boxed retail copy. Of course, like other boxed releases for downloads, there won't be a game disc in there, but GameStop lists a bunch of stuff that the box will contain. Basically, it's a Collector's Edition of a downloadable game. Oddly, there's no Xbox 360 version of this item.

According to the product listing, the Marvel vs. Capcom 2 Retail Pack will release on August 13 for $19.99 ($5 more than the cost of the game) and include a redemption code (obviously), a DVD case, a disc containing exclusive wallpapers and other media, an 8-page manual, one month of free access to Marvel Digital Comics, and 2,000 Capcom Unity points, which are used on the Capcom site to participate in auctions.

Capcom offered no official comment on this release, so this will have to remain unconfirmed for now.