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The movie Scott Pilgrim vs. The World hits theaters tomorrow, but for PlayStation 3 owners, Scott Pilgrim: The Video Game is already available (lucky bastards!). Unfortunately for Xbox 360 owners, Scott Pilgrim: The Video Game isn’t hitting Xbox Live Arcade until August 25th. If you’re smarter than me and have a PS3 instead of a 360, and have already had the pleasure of playing the game, let us know what you think!

Probably the biggest video game news over the last week was the reveal of Batman Arkham Asylum sequel, Batman Arkham City. We were given a few details of the game, and I’m not entirely sure how I like it yet. The name “Arkham City,” and the first trailer we saw back in November gave us the idea that we would be moving from the walls of Arkham Asylum to the streets of Gotham City, with Arkham and Black Gate inmates taking over. That’s not exactly the case.

With Arkham Asylum and Black Gate Prison no longer fit to hold Gotham’s ugliest, Quincy Sharp, who you’ll remember as warden of Arkham Asylum in the first game, has purchased a section of the slums in Gotham and constructed walls around the area in the form of one giant prison city.

Not a totally realistic story standpoint, right? I mean, what city would actually allow something like that? While it seems very odd, at least we can hopefully get the larger open world, Grand Theft Auto scale of a sandbox environment. And Batmobile usage? God I hope so!

A UK website leaked some very interesting information from the September issue of Game Informer which will feature big details on Arkham City, and while there is no way to really verify the legitimacy of this information, for some readers’ sake….

**WARNING! The following may contain Batman Arkham City spoilers!**

Game Informer Story info:

– Quincy Sharp is now running for mayor.
– Arkham Asylum and Black Gate Prison are unfit to hold inmates.
– Quincy Sharp buys off part of the slums and walls it off, creating Arkham City.
– Hugo Strange is in charge of Arkham City.
– Two-Face plans to execute Catwoman to gain respect of inmates.
– The overdose of venom may not be what’s wrong with the Joker.

Game Informer Gameplay info:

– You are now able to counter two attacks at once.
– More puzzles.
– All gadgets included in the first game are available from the start.
– Side missions now feature in the game.
– Gangs roam Arkham City, these are recorded in Batman’s criminal database.
– You find people who work for Riddler to find Riddler challenges.
– Batman has his smoke bomb.

Sounds like cool stuff to me! Especially the Riddler challenges. That was one of my favorite parts of Arkham Asylum. And I also really appreciate having all the original gadgets available at the start of the game…assuming any of this is true, that is.

Also, there’s been a rumor of a secret room in Warden Quincy sharp’s office in Arkham Asylum that contains maps of Arkham City, however, there has yet to be any reporting of anyone finding this room, and I just searched every inch of the place, and I’ve found nothing. Oh well.

While Arkham City is over a year away from releasing, Spider-Man: Shattered Dimensions is just around the corner. A new trailer featuring the Vulture hit the web and it looks pretty freaky. Like, Count Orlok freaky. Check it out here.

Shattered Dimensions has really pleased me personally with their job of voice casting. These aren’t just struggling B performance voice actors cast out of nowhere; each Spider-Man incarnation is being voiced by an actor who has previously voiced Web Head in past animated series!

Neil Patrick Harris has already been announced to reprise his role of Spider-Man from the 2003 animated series by voicing 616 Spidy, Dan Gilvezan of Spider-Man and His Amazing Friends will be voicing 2099 Spidy, Christopher Daniel Barnes of the 1990s Spider-Man show (and to this day the voice I hear in my head when reading a piece of Spidy dialog) will voice Spider-Man Noir, and Josh Keaton of the more recent Spectacular Spider-Man will voice Ultimate Spider-Man.

Not exactly an all-star cast by Hollywood’s standard, but to me and the hardcore Spider-Man fans, we couldn’t have asked for better actors!

Well, True Believers, this week I’ll leave you with this. A little gem from a lost and forgotten (for good reason) X-Men game, X-Men: The Ravages Of Apocalypse. In 1997, Marvel sanctioned a rip off of the first-person-shooter Quake where you play as a a cyborg Magneto built to kill Apocalypse’s army of X-Men clones…and no, I’m not making this up.

I must have LOL’d at this video for half an hour straight. Enjoy it here.

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Andrew Hurst
andrewhurst@comicattack.net