Over at the other side of the Atlantic, some game industry observers have expressed concern that the launch of Nintendo's Wii Fit may offset the sales of Rockstar Games' Grand Theft Auto IV (Microsoft Xbox 360, Sony PlayStation 3). Analyst Jesse Divnich begs to differ, though. He says there may be a bit of a hit early, but things shouldn't be as rough as some may think. Details in the full article.

Cheating in video games is almost as old as video gaming itself. It's never long before someone decides that he wants to take the easy way out. This would seem unfair to others who choose play by the rules of the game, however.

But what is cheating anyway? And when is it allowable, and when is it unfair?

Granted, the video game console is rapidly becoming saturated with the same genres: shooters, action, sports, sandbox. Innovation did happen, but a lot of it was stove-piped, locked within the genre rather than in the greater world of console gaming itself.

Brave is a title that bucks conventions and is willing to take risks. One more recent development was bringing the traditionally PC-centric real-time strategy genre to consoles, which until games like Full Spectrum Warrior and Battle for Middle-Earth II, were rather clunky and painful affairs. But now, we have Command & Conquer 3, and Ensemble is spinning Halo Wars up to speed.

In the same vein I'm taking another PC-centric game genre and looking at its chances in console gaming. Except this time, unlike RTS games, I'm less confident about its chances - not because it can't be done, but out of the fear that just like innovation, interests in console gaming are rather stove-piped as well. And for the most part, the console is locked to shooters, action, sports, and sandbox.

Pity, really. Consoles could be a potential breakout ground for the submarine simulator.

Thar she blows up, Cap'n. Appreciation - and cynicism - for console subsims after the jump.

 

GameInformer has scored a few more bits of information regarding the Half-Life 2 Orange and Black Boxes. According to the website, Valve's Doug Lombardi clarified that console users will only be able to purchase the Orange Box, while PC users have a choice between the two.

Both the Orange and Black Box editions of Half-Life will be available at either retails stores or via Steam (for PC users only, of course). When these editions launch, you won't be able to buy the contents separately. You'll have to buy the whole package.

Speaking of consoles, a Wii release from Valve is also something that has sparked a lot of fan discussion. While Valve currently has no Wii projects in development, Lombardi stressed that "the company was quite surprised by the interface and wouldn't rule out anything just yet."

Lombardi also cleared things up regarding the delays that have surrounded Half-Life 2: Episode 2. While a lot of people believed that the next installment was delayed to include the two other games, Lombardi said that this wasn't the case. According to Lombardi, "Nothing is done yet. Portal is the closest, but it's not done today."

Those who have already upgraded their PCs' video cards to support Direct X 10 will also be happy to find out that both Episode 2 and Team Fortress 2 will support Direct X 10. Valve also plans to include Direct X 8 support, and the company is also planning to support the older Direct X 7, but no confirmation has yet been made regarding the latter.

Some reports have pegged the release of all three versions of the packages as Winter 2007 but according to Lombardi, the current schedule is to release them concurrently in the Fall.