Ubisoft officially insane

We're not mad, we just really, really hate you, publisher protests

DRM has had a patchy time in recent years, with measures designed to prevent piracy instead driving consumers towards it in droves. But while Valve have won over digital gamers through fair policies that don't impinge on the player's experience, Ubisoft have been engaged in an ongoing series of bizarre experiments, which include freezing Assassin's Creed 2 whenever the user's net connection cuts out, even if only for a second. Sometimes it happens for hours at a time, as happened back in 2010.

Such batshittery was only the start though, with hardware site Guru3D learning during their testing process that swapping out even a single component of their PC caused Anno 2070 to completely lock them out.

Ubisoft's response? Well, you shouldn't be swapping out hardware components, should you?

What's a PC, anyway? We only use Macs around the office.

Nintendo in crap online shocker

It barely qualifies as news by this point, but once again Nintendo has made good on its commitment to always be several years behind the curve.

Our debacle du jour comes from Mario Kart 7 on the 3DS; while Nintendo were powerless to do anything about the infamous snaking glitch in the DS iteration of the racing series, they have every power to patch an oversight in MK7, in which powering into the water at a specific point of Wuhu Mountain Loop allows you to respawn across the other side of the lake, neatly skipping a healthy portion of the track.

Nintendo have refused to apply a patch, saying that it would create an unfair advantage for patch-less players, but this means that either Nintendo can't force updates on players before they take their games online, despite being common practice on pretty much every other gaming device on the market, or they genuinely think that people playing over local multiplayer are going to be powerless to stop cheaters despite being within punching distance of them.

Or maybe they're still not quite getting this online deely. This is starting to get pretty tragic, Nintendo.

Half Life: Portal - the next major Valve release?

vadeg

Let the baseless conjecture begin

As one of the most important, genre-defining FPS series ever created, the Half Life rumour mill is always in business, with rumours still flying fast and thick of a 2012 announcement of the next series instalment. Just like in 2011, in fact. And 2010. Every year since 2007, really.

So, to get in the spirit of things, I'm going to throw my hat into the ring and explain why I think the next instalment of the series could involve a Half Life/Portal mash-up:

Digital Remix: Bit Brigade

Pray silence for the finest in guitar-shredding, speed-running goodness

Once in a while you come across something that makes you glad to be alive. Something where you really feel the privilege of being a sentient creature with the sensory faculties to enjoy said something. It's all subjective of course, and unless you really crave the electric mixture of live bands, retro game music and 8-bit speed runs, the following video is probably going to leave you a bit cold. But if all three float your boat, then the following video is about as perfect a blend as is ever likely to exist. So, if you have forty-five minutes to spare and a head in need of some banging (so to speak), then it is my pleasure to introduce you to the truly magnificent Bit Brigade.

Until next time, and a happy new year to all.